How to clear or delete recent pictures on iMessage on OS X Mavericks

Hi,

Pre Mountain Lion it was ~/Library/Images/iChat Recents Pictures

The Recents and Linked options it shows in Mavericks are saved from the Login pic in System Preferences > Users and Groups > Your account > Login pic, the My Card in the Contacts app and the Buddy Lists in Messages.

I have spent some time looking for this combined set of pictures but I can't find it.

9:35 pm Sunday; January 19, 2014

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mavericks 10.9)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

If you just want to get rid of some old pictures that appear in "Recent" there, one option is replacing them with new ones, it can only hold 12. You can just keep choosing some default or other photo you want there and use edit button there where you can change size and add effects. It will keep creating many versions of it and eventually fills your Recents with those, the old will then disappear.

Hi Jim CA,

That is odd as I have 18 + the default Head and Shoulders option

Note you can normally see 16 but I have 1/2 scrolled to see the line about to be pushed off the top and the new line at the bottom.

The iCloud option includes all the pics currently in PhotoStream.

Defaults include all the System Login pic options + all the iChat icon options, Flags, Guitars, Jewels, Planets, Masks, Flowers and Fruits and some "animal" ones.

I am having trouble getting it to see the Faces options.

8:41 pm Tuesday; January 21, 2014

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mavericks 10.9)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

Sorry, CheilaBrasil and Ralph, false alarm. I didn't know it was a scrolling window since Apple decided to hide the scroll bar, all of my old ones are below the 12 that fit in window. So it looks like there may be no limit to how many pictures it will hold and as far as we know, there is no way to delete any now in Mavericks, they sure did hide them well, very odd they wouldn't show up somewhere as at least that tiny thumbnail. I don't even have some of those original icons and photos anymore.

Hi,

I think you used to be able to right (Control) click and then delete them but that also seems not to work now.

A few months back I did discover where the new combined folder that stores these was.

If I Change any of them (Login Pic, Address Card or Buddy list) then the Date Modifed column in the ~/Library shows the Caches folder says it is updated. However digging deeper I can't find where it is.

9:05 pm Tuesday; January 21, 2014

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mavericks 10.9)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad

Go to System Preferences: Users & Groups, then click on your profile picture and go to Recents then select the one you want to remove and select from menu: edit/cut.

Once this is done restart messages and they should have also disappeared from there.

There is no "Cut" there in Mavericks, maybe previous version had that.

Wooo hoo, just found the solution! All you have to do is click on the pic you want to delete in Recents and hit what else but the delete key on keyboard! I just thought hmmm maybe I can just hit delete. It was too simple, no wonder we couldn't find it! lol Although really simple would be a delete button there I guess.

I should add that this needs to be done from "Users and Groups" in System Preferences, not in iMessage "Change my Picture" window which looks the same, the delete key won't work there. The same pictures are in both.

My mavericks has cut option there, and yes, it runs for everybody. Just need to read more carefully. And say thanks.

Interesting.

I had not thought to do it that way (I am also sure it was different in iChat).

However from my earlier pic I had the eagle in the bottom row just before the Head and Shoulders default.

For some reason I cannot delete this one.

At first I thought it might be a Linked one.

It may be this as although it does not show in the Linked drop down it is the current pic I have set in the Login pic.

On the other hand it maybe something different as I changed the Login pic to something from PhotoStream/iCloud and it still cannot be deleted.

7:48 pm Wednesday; January 22, 2014

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mavericks 10.9)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad