How to View EXIF Data on iPhone

Since iOS 15 the Photos app has shown the full camera and exposure details directly — no download, no shortcut, no third-party viewer. Most people never find it because the gesture is not obvious.

1. Step 1Open the photoIn Photos, tap the image so it fills the screen.
2. Step 2Swipe up, or tap ⓘBoth do the same thing. The info panel slides up from the bottom.
3. Step 3Read the camera lineDevice and lens, then aperture, shutter speed, ISO and focal length. Tap the megapixel figure for the exact dimensions and file size.
4. Step 4Check for a mapIf a map appears beneath, the photo is geotagged. Tap it for the place name and a wider view.
5. Step 5Adjust the date if neededTap Adjust beside the date to correct a wrong timestamp — useful after importing scans, and a reminder that EXIF is editable.

The most common cause by far is the second one. Almost every social platform strips metadata during upload, so a photo saved from a feed has usually lost its GPS tags long before it reaches your camera roll. That behaviour, and what survives it, is covered in the EXIF guide.

For most purposes the built-in panel is enough. It becomes limiting only when you need the fields Apple chose not to display, which are mostly of interest when verifying provenance rather than browsing your own library.

This is the single most useful iOS privacy control most people have never opened. It is per-share, so it must be set each time — there is no global switch that removes location from everything you send.

iOS 15 already included the Adjust controls for both date and location, and showed megapixels, pixel dimensions and file size together. So if a control described here is missing on your device, you are most likely on iOS 14 or earlier, where the panel exists but carries far less.