Can't delete photo attachments from Photos on iOS

I’m sent photos from friends. I save them to photos, however there seems to be no way to delete these photos(attachments) from either my iPad or iPhone. This is not a problem when on my Mac as Apple gives the option to delete attachments but this option is missing on iPad and iPhone??

iPhone 16, iOS 18

Posted on Jan 4, 2026 3:31 PM

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3 replies

Jan 5, 2026 2:27 PM in response to Richard.Taylor

Thanks for reply. To be clear - I want to delete photo attachments in apple Mail on iPhone and iPad. Mac is not a problem as there is an option to delete attachments. I’ve been told just delete the email, but I want to keep the email not the photo attachments as they’ve been saved to the Photos app. This is using up and enormous amount of space on my iPhone and again on my iPad!

Jan 6, 2026 7:06 AM in response to Tony Rees

Ah-- I didn't see a mention of email in your post. And I have no solution for email. If you can remove the attachment on the Mac, you might just forward the email without the attachment to give you a copy on the iPhone. You can also save emails as PDFs in iCloud Drive and have them available on the phone.


It's interesting-- it looks like that anymore there is little that differentiates the message from an attachment-- many emails are primarily attached images.

Can't delete photo attachments from Photos on iOS

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