I currently only have 1600 photos of which 225 are videos however on my iphone storage it says the photos app has taken up 18GB of space. How do I fix this?

None of the videos are over 1 minute long. I also cleared out my recently deleted and restarted my phone, but it still says 18GB.

iPhone 12, iOS 16

Posted on Aug 8, 2023 7:49 AM

Reply
5 replies

Aug 8, 2023 8:49 AM in response to alister83

OK, it’s clear you know what you are doing. Sometimes when you delete stuff it doesn’t do instant “garbage collection” to recover the freed space. So I suggest waiting a day or two, and if you don’t get it back do a complete backup of your phone, then restore that backup. You can do either a computer backup or iCloud backup, or both for “belt and suspenders” security. For a computer backup check Encrypted Backup, and write down the password, because there is no way to recover it.


BTW, do you currently have automatic nightly iCloud backups enabled?

Aug 8, 2023 8:27 AM in response to alister83

How did you delete the photos and videos? When you delete them they aren’t actually deleted; they are moved to the Recently Deleted album, so you can recover them if you change your mind. After 30 days they are removed from Recently Deleted.


Also note that if you delete photos from your phone they are also deleted from iCloud if you sync to iCloud, so don’t count on them still being available in iCloud when you remove them from your phone.

This thread has been closed by the system or the community team. You may vote for any posts you find helpful, or search the Community for additional answers.

I currently only have 1600 photos of which 225 are videos however on my iphone storage it says the photos app has taken up 18GB of space. How do I fix this?

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.