What EXIF data reveals about your photos, and how to remove it

What EXIF is

Exif (Exchangeable image file format) is a standard for storing information inside image files. Since 2009 it has been managed jointly by CIPA, the Camera and Imaging Products Association, and JEITA, a Japanese electronics industry body. The current version, Exif 3.0, was published in May 2023.

In a JPEG file, the details sit in their own block (the APP1 segment) next to the picture data. That matters later: because the block is separate, it can be taken out without touching the picture.

What a photo can carry

The standard defines many fields. Which ones are filled in depends on the device and its settings. The common ones:

• Date and time: the moment the photo was taken, by the device's clock.
• Camera: the make and model, and since Exif 2.3 lens information.
• Camera settings: technical details of how the shot was taken.
• Location: GPS coordinates, if the camera had access to location when the photo was taken.
• Software: the app or firmware that last saved the file.
• Maker notes: a manufacturer's own block, which on some cameras includes a serial number.
• A small preview thumbnail, plus optional names, copyright and comments.

What it means in practice

Each detail on its own is usually harmless. Together they can say more than you meant to. A photo of something you're selling, taken at home and sent as the original file, can carry the coordinates of your home. A set of photos with times and places shows where someone was and when. A serial number, where present, can link photos from the same camera.

This is not a reason to fear every photo. It's a reason to think about who receives the original file. Family members with your holiday pictures: probably fine. A stranger buying a chair, a public forum, or a document sent to someone you don't know: worth cleaning first.

Switch off location at the source

If you rarely want location in your photos, the simplest fix is to stop the camera adding it.

• iPhone: Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > Camera, then tap Never.
• iPhone, for one share: in the Share Sheet tap Options and turn off Location. Location Not Included then appears above the Options button.
• Pixel phones: open the Camera app, tap Settings, then More settings, and turn off Save location.
• Other Android phones: the camera apps differ, so look in the camera's own settings for a location option.

Don't count on the receiver to clean it

Some services remove details from the copies they show, others keep them, and you can't see what a service stores behind the scenes. An email attachment or a file shared as a file is the file itself, details included. Clean the copy before it leaves your device and you don't have to rely on anyone else.

Removing details: lossless versus re-saving

There are two ways to strip photo details. One opens the image, decodes it and saves a new file without them. That works for any format, but a JPEG saved again is compressed again, so a little quality is lost each time. Many image editors also change or drop details on saving, so the result isn't always predictable.

The other way removes only the metadata blocks and leaves the picture data alone. That is how our tool cleans JPG, PNG and WebP files: the pixels are not re-saved, the colour profile stays, and the orientation tag stays so the photo still stands upright. Formats it can't clean that way, such as HEIC and AVIF, are saved as a new JPG, and the results list says so.

Before removing anything, the tool lists what it found: date, camera, software, names and rights, text and comments, and the location if there is one. You can choose ‘Everything (location, date, camera, comments)’ or ‘Only the location (keep date taken and camera)’. The ‘Show on a map’ link opens OpenStreetMap only when you click it, and the coordinates are sent there at that moment.