Most photos carry more than the picture. Phones and cameras tuck a block of extra information inside the file, and unless something removes it, that block travels with the photo wherever you send it.
Usually it is harmless. Sometimes it is the exact location of your house. This guide covers what is in there, when it gets removed for you, when it doesn’t, and how to check and clean a photo yourself before it goes anywhere public.
What photo metadata is
Metadata is data about the photo rather than the photo itself. There are a few kinds you will come across:
- EXIF is the one your phone or camera writes when you take the picture. It holds the camera settings, the date and time and, if location is switched on, GPS coordinates.
- XMP was originally developed by Adobe and is mostly added by editing software. It can hold captions, keywords, the creator’s name and a record of which programs have edited the file.
- IPTC comes from the news industry and is used by photographers and agencies for captions, credits, copyright and contact details.
None of this is visible when you look at the photo, which is why it is so easy to forget.
What it can contain
Here is what you might find, and why it matters once the photo leaves your hands.
| Information | Where it usually comes from | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| GPS coordinates, sometimes altitude and direction | Phones with location tagging on | A photo taken at home gives away your address, often to within a few metres |
| Date and time taken | Almost every camera and phone | Shows when you were somewhere, and can reveal routines |
| Camera or phone make and model | Almost every camera and phone | Narrows down who took it |
| Camera body or lens serial number | Some dedicated cameras | Can link photos posted under different names to the same device |
| Owner, artist, copyright or contact details | Camera settings, editing apps, agencies | Your name and sometimes your email or phone number |
| Software and editing history | Editing apps | Shows the photo was edited, and with what |
| Embedded thumbnail | Many cameras and phones | A small preview that may not be updated after editing, so it can still show what you cropped out |
The thumbnail catches people out. Crop a photo to hide something, and if the editing app leaves the old preview in place, the cropped part is still in the file.
When it gets removed for you, and when it doesn’t
The big social networks generally strip location data from the copy that other people see. That is helpful, but it is their decision, it can change, and they may keep the original themselves. Plenty of other routes keep the file exactly as you sent it.
Routes where I would assume the metadata survives unless you have checked:
- Email attachments. The recipient gets your original file.
- File-sharing and cloud links. Whoever opens the link downloads the original.
- Messaging apps, when you send a photo as a file or document rather than as a photo, or choose an “original quality” option. Sending as a photo often compresses it and may strip metadata, but behaviour varies between apps and versions.
- Website uploads. Many content management systems keep the file you uploaded and may serve it, or link to it, even when they also generate smaller copies for the page.
- Online marketplaces and forums. Some strip metadata, some don’t, and it is hard to tell from the outside.
The safest habit is simple: don’t rely on the service. Clean the photo before you upload it, and it doesn’t matter what happens next.
Small businesses and sellers
This matters more than it first appears for two groups.
If you run a small business and add photos to your own website, those photos often come straight off a phone. A picture of a product on your kitchen table, or of a job you finished at a customer’s house, can carry the coordinates of your home or theirs. I build websites for clients and I treat stripping metadata as part of preparing images for the web, alongside resizing and compression. It belongs on any website launch checklist too.
If you sell things online, the photos of what you’re selling are usually taken at home. A buyer, or someone just browsing, doesn’t need to know where that is.
How to check a photo
Open the EXIF Viewer and Remover and drop in one or more photos. For each one it lists what it found, with the sensitive items first: location, time, device, names and contact details, software, and whether there is an embedded thumbnail (which it shows you). Open “All metadata” for every entry.
The photos are read by your browser on your own device and are not uploaded. The one exception is the optional “View on OpenStreetMap” link: if you click it, the coordinates are sent to OpenStreetMap so it can show the map. You don’t need to click it.
Your operating system’s file properties or a photo app’s info panel also show some metadata, but usually a selection rather than everything.
How to strip it
Losslessly, with the EXIF Remover
The EXIF Viewer and Remover takes out the metadata sections and copies the compressed image data exactly as it was. The picture is identical pixel for pixel, and the file gets slightly smaller. It removes:
- EXIF, including GPS, dates, camera details, serial numbers and the thumbnail
- XMP and IPTC
- comments and PNG text notes
- anything stored after the end of the image, such as the video part of a “motion photo”
It keeps two things that affect how the photo displays: the colour profile, without which photos from recent phones can look dull, and, if you leave the option ticked, the orientation, so portrait photos don’t end up on their side. The orientation is written into a new, tiny EXIF block containing nothing else.
It works with JPEG, PNG and WebP. It does not handle HEIC, the format many iPhones use by default.
By re-encoding, with the Image Compressor
The Image Compressor also removes metadata, but in a different way. It decodes the image and saves a new one, so nothing from the original file’s metadata comes along. It rotates the photo the right way up first.
The trade-off is that re-encoding changes the pixels slightly and resets the quality. It also converts colours to standard sRGB and turns animated images into a still of the first frame. In return you can resize, reduce the file size and change format in the same step, and it accepts more formats, including HEIC in browsers that can open it, such as Safari.
| EXIF Viewer and Remover | Image Compressor | |
|---|---|---|
| Method | Removes metadata, copies image data untouched | Decodes and saves a new image |
| Picture quality | Identical | Slightly changed, depending on the quality setting |
| Formats | JPEG, PNG, WebP | JPEG, PNG, WebP, GIF, AVIF and more, depending on your browser |
| Resize or convert | No | Yes |
| Colour profile | Kept | Converted to sRGB |
| Shows you what was there | Yes | No |
My rule of thumb: if the photo is already the right size and you just want it clean, use the EXIF Remover. If it is going on a website and needs resizing anyway, the Image Compressor does both jobs at once.
Stopping it at the source
Phones let you turn off location tagging for the camera. On an iPhone it is in the Location Services section of the privacy settings. On Android it is usually a setting inside the camera app, and its name varies between manufacturers. Some phones also let you leave the location out when sharing: on an iPhone, the share sheet has an Options link for this.
This only affects new photos. Everything already in your gallery keeps its location data. And you may like having locations on your own photos, for sorting and memories, in which case cleaning copies as you share them is the better approach.
The limits
Removing metadata cleans the file, not the scene. A street sign, a house number, a view from a window or a distinctive landmark can still give a location away. Look at the picture with a stranger’s eyes before you post it.
File names can leak information too. Phones often name photos with the date and time they were taken, and the EXIF Remover keeps the original file names. Rename the cleaned copy if that matters.
The originals on your device are not changed. Make sure it is the cleaned copy you share, not the one next to it.
Finally, you have to trust my code to do what I say. You don’t have to take my word for it: you can run any cleaned photo back through the viewer and confirm that nothing sensitive is listed, or check it in another metadata tool you already trust.
Before you share a photo
- Ask where the photo is going and whether the service keeps the original file. If you don’t know, assume it does.
- Drop it into the EXIF Viewer and Remover and look at the location, device and people sections.
- Download the cleaned copy, or use the Image Compressor if it also needs resizing.
- Check the picture itself for signs, house numbers and anything else that identifies a place.
- Rename the file if the name gives away more than you would like, then share the cleaned copy.