Photos keep re-appearing after deleting on iPhone

Why do photos reappear in my messages after I've deleted them?


[Re-Titled by Moderator]

iPhone 13, iOS 16

Posted on Jun 4, 2023 6:59 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jun 4, 2023 7:00 PM

Deleting photos from your “Photos” app does not automatically delete them from your text messages in the “Messages” app, and vice versa. If you delete a photo from a conversation in “Messages”, it only removes it from that specific conversation. The original photo still remains in your “Photos” app. If you delete it from the “Photos” app, it can still exist within your message threads.


To completely delete a photo from your device, you need to:


1. Delete it from the “Photos” app.

2. Delete it from the conversation in the “Messages” app.

3. Delete it from the “Recently Deleted” album in your “Photos” app (photos remain there for 30 days after deletion, unless manually removed).


Remember, if you’ve set your messages to automatically delete after a certain period of time, the photo will also be deleted when the message thread is. To check this setting, go to “Settings” > “Messages” > “Keep Messages”, and see if you have it set to 30 days or 1 year. If not, you can change it to automatically delete older messages and their attachments.


Also, if you’re using iCloud Photos and Messages in iCloud, the photos may reappear due to syncing with iCloud. You would need to ensure the photo is deleted from these locations as well.


As always, ensure you really want to delete these photos as this process is not reversible.

30 replies

Feb 16, 2024 9:53 AM in response to nexusnode

I don’t think you quite understood the actual question. The question asked why when deleted from messages, why they reappear in messages. Never did they say, the images were in their camera roll. Also, it shouldn’t matter if they’re in the camera roll. They’re not trying to delete from there, again from messages.


This happens to me constantly. I will try to clean up a txt that I don’t want to delete but could have pics sent to me, screenshots sent to me, videos sent to me, gifs sent to me - none of which are in my photos. I will go in and do a massive clean up and can guarantee those files will be right back in there. Has nothing to do with photos. E

Apr 7, 2024 10:41 PM in response to hwt1972

What I’ve experienced is that it doesn’t happen with all the photos in iMessage but a few. Well that doesn’t matter when it comes to deleting them it should delete completely and to make it permanent I confirm it by deleting them from the Recently deleted folder in iMessage but what most horrifying is that they shows up at the same place in iMessage after awhile.


Have you guys also checked deleting them from recently deleted and still facing the issue?


iMessage = Weird

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Photos keep re-appearing after deleting on iPhone

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