How do I eliminate the Face Id setup nag (little red circle in Settings) for iOS 26.2???

Your face is not stored it Apple's servers.

Either live with the nag or set it up, then turn it off.

Gonkdroid wrote:

Yeah, Jeff is cool.

It's not that I didn't like your "answer", it's that it wasn't an answer. Like if I asked, "Whats the weather going to be like today", and the answer given is, "you missed an apostrophe after the t". Sure that response is great information for future reference, but I still don't know if I need an umbrella.

I get it. But I'm not sorry I at least took my personal time to point out that Apple has never stored our biometrics on their servers. And that seemed to be you reason or concern for not wanting to use Face ID.

You can do what you want as it's your phone. On a final note, KiltedTim actually gave the right answer. You can either live with the notification or set it up, then turn it off, which would eliminate the notification. Just saying........

Gonkdroid wrote:

• In iOS 26.2 for the iPhone, my settings app icon has a little red circle with the number "1" in it, because it wants me to set up Face Id. I want to get rid of this little nagging red circle.

I'm not going to use Face Id.

• I'm not going to use any of the features that depend on Face Id.

I want Apple to never• have my face stored in their Face Id servers.

If the answer is, "well the only way is to set up face id then turn it off",

[Edited by Moderator]

You are misinformed, which leads to paranoia. Face ID is 100% encrypted on your iPhone and Apple does not, nor has it EVER had your face stored on Apple's servers. NEVER EVER. It's of course your choice to not use Face ID. But if your reason for doing is based on false facts, no one can help you. It's sad to see people believing things which are simply not true.

Hello~ Your “face” is not nor ever has been store in Apple servers. Who told you this? In fact facial recognition on your iPhone is probably the safest place to use it. Now…facial recognition in other places…

~Katana-San~

Gonkdroid wrote:

The question I asked was "how do I get rid of the nag for face id", not "how does face id work". What leads to my paranoia is the fact that that it seems to be forcing me to give up that biometric data when it doens't need to.

(Also: Note to moderator: if you're going to edit out a perfectly harmless phrase in a sentence, you might want to just axe the whole sentence. What you left in is completely meaningless for anyone who googles and finds this question.)

I wasn't actually addressing the part of your question on how to remove the notification to set up Face ID. I was pointing out that your paranoia is not grounded in fact. I see Jeff has now given you an answer you like.

You do you, no arguments here. I’m glad you found a solution you’re satisfied with. Take care!