How to permanently disable Live Photos?

The "preserve Setting" is currently the only option to turn Live off by preserving the last Setting for Live. Then Live will stay off, until you accidentally touch the Live button, when you grab your iPhone.

The safest way to avoid shooting Live Photos would be to use a third party camera app, as you asked in your original post. But it is hard to recommend one. You will need to try them out yourself, because they are simulating professional cameras and you will have to check the look and feel., if you can work with them as fast as with the native iPhone camera.

You may want to check out Halide Mark II Professional Camera or Spectre, but check out the App Store.

On all accounts, report this directly to Apple. They need to know about this problem.

You can use the feedback form: Apple - Feedback - Index

You can set the Camera's settings on the iPhone so that the default mode when the camera is next opened is photos. There are two of them that should get you what you want:

1 - Settings/Camera/Preserve Settings/Live Photo:

2 - Settings/Camera/Camera Mode:

Turn both off and see if that will get you what you want.

rob_yrob wrote:

nope - I have just tried that and next time I opened it Live Photo was back on again

I just tried that after rebooting iOS 15.8.2 and iPadOS 17.5.1 and LivePhotos and Preserve Settings were preserved as desired. Maybe you should Reset the device to factory defaults and try again?

rob_yrob wrote:

rebooting the phone it turns Live Photo back on by default every single time.

Thanks for the note. I very seldom reboot the phone but I check that issue the next time I do. Otherwise Live Photos stays OFF for me unless flippy fingers accidentally turn it ON in the camera mode.

I am keeping LIVe on, all the time, unless I am wanting to take a RAW photo or a Portrait or a Pano. I like the Live effects to create motion trail, to add depth to a landscape, when leaves are moving in the wind, to make create a long exposure of running water - a creek or s waterfall, a fountain spouting water, the breakers at the beach when the surf is high, wildlife photos.

I am using the Live Photos whenever I would otherwise record a short video clip. Adding a loop or bounce effect will stabilise it instantly, and if it cannot be stabilised, I can fall back on the high resolution still frame and turn Live off. I duplicate the "still" version as a still photo and delete the Live version.

I am creating my photo books with Pages and save them as ePub books to the Books.app. This way I can browse the photo books on my iPad, and can see the embedded Live Photos automatically animated, when I turn the pages. The Live Photos are also saving the sound, when I view a picture of a church, I can hier the sound of the bells. Or the sound of the animals in wild life photos.

I will have to change to a different format for my photo books, once I had taken more 3D videos. I have not yet found a way to add 3D videos to a Pages document, as I could not yet find a version of Pages for my Apple Vision Pro.

Have you tried a reboot of the iPhone?

Hello~ You can go to Settings >> Camera > >Preserve Settings >> Live Photo …Turn On. So when you turn Live Photo off in the Camera App it will stay off. Post back if needed.

~Katana-San~