How to Make Your iPhone Photos Take Up Less Space

iPhone photos and videos are the biggest storage consumer for most users. A few settings changes and habits can dramatically reduce storage use without losing memories.

Setting 1: Use HEIC format (already on by default)

iPhone defaults to HEIC format which uses about half the storage of JPG at the same quality.

Verify it’s on:

Settings → Camera → Formats
Select High Efficiency (the default)

The “Most Compatible” option saves as JPG instead, which uses 2× the storage. Only use that if you regularly send photos to Windows users who can’t handle HEIC.

For sharing widely without compatibility issues, use HEIC to JPG to convert specific photos when needed.

Setting 2: Use HEVC for video

Same idea for video:

Settings → Camera → Record Video
Encoder Settings: HEVC (H.265) instead of H.264

HEVC saves ~50% of space at the same quality. Same compatibility trade-off as HEIC.

Setting 3: Lower the video resolution

4K video uses 4× the storage of 1080p:

Settings → Camera → Record Video
Choose 1080p at 30 fps (default for most users)
Or 720p at 30 fps for even smaller files

For casual phone video (kids’ birthdays, day-to-day), 1080p is plenty. 4K matters for cinematography, large-screen viewing, professional work.

Setting 4: Disable Burst Mode hold

By default, holding the shutter starts burst mode (taking 10 photos per second). Burst photos use a lot of storage.

Settings → Camera
Use Volume Up for Burst: turn OFF (or on, your choice)

If burst is on by default, hold-press for video, tap for photo. Less accidental burst.

Setting 5: Enable iCloud Photos with “Optimize iPhone Storage”

iCloud Photos uploads your library to iCloud and keeps lower-resolution versions on your iPhone:

Settings → [Your Name] → iCloud → Photos
Enable iCloud Photos
Choose Optimize iPhone Storage

How it works:

Full-resolution photos in iCloud
Compressed versions on your iPhone
When you tap to view a photo, it downloads full resolution
When storage gets tight, less-recently-viewed photos are removed from device (still in iCloud)

The catch: requires sufficient iCloud storage (50 GB at $0.99/month is enough for most users; 200 GB at $2.99/month for larger libraries).

This is the single most effective way to reduce on-device storage.

Setting 6: Disable Live Photos

Live Photos capture 1.5 seconds of video around each photo. Useful for some moments, wasteful for most:

To stop new Live Photos:

Open Camera
Tap the Live Photos icon (circles in top-right of viewfinder)
Tap to turn off (or on selectively)

For existing Live Photos, you can:

Convert to still photo: select photo → Edit → tap Live Photo button to remove animation
Delete the videos: bulk option not available in Photos; use a third-party app

Setting 7: Delete or compress existing photos

For long-term storage reduction:

Delete duplicates: see our Find Duplicate Photos guide.

Delete photos you don’t need: review monthly. Cull burst shots, blurry photos, screenshots you took once.

Convert old photos to JPG if you don’t need HEIC anymore (saves nothing on storage but improves compatibility).

Convert burst sequences to single photos: keep the best shot, delete the rest.

Setting 8: Backup and offload

If your library is too big for iCloud:

Photos on a NAS or external drive:

Connect your iPhone to a computer
Import photos using Photos.app (Mac) or Windows Photos
Once safely backed up, delete from iPhone

Google Photos:

Install Google Photos app
Enable backup
Photos sync to Google account (free or paid storage)
Manage from iPhone or any device

Amazon Photos (free for Prime members): unlimited photo storage included with Prime.

Setting 9: Settings that consume hidden space

Recently Deleted folder: photos linger here for 30 days after deletion. Settings → Photos → Recently Deleted to delete permanently and reclaim space immediately.

Messages with attached photos: text conversations contain photos that count toward iPhone storage. Settings → General → iPhone Storage → Messages → review and clean.

Apps that download photos (Snapchat, Instagram, others): Settings → General → iPhone Storage → review apps for photo caches.

Setting 10: Periodic review

Set a calendar reminder for monthly photo cleanup:

Open Photos → All Photos
Scroll through last month
Delete: bad shots, duplicates, unnecessary screenshots, things you’ll never look at again
Repeat next month

5 minutes a month prevents the “my phone has 80 GB of photos I haven’t looked at in years” situation.

How much storage is in photos vs videos

Typical breakdown:

Photos (HEIC): ~1-4 MB each
Live Photos: ~3-8 MB each (with the video)
Burst photos: 10-20× per burst
1080p video: ~50 MB per minute
4K video: ~200 MB per minute

For a typical user with 2,000 photos and 50 videos:

Photos: ~6 GB
Videos: ~10 GB
Total: ~16 GB

Reducing the video count or resolution has the biggest single impact.

TL;DR

Use HEIC format (default): half the storage of JPG
Use HEVC video codec: half the storage of H.264
Record at 1080p, not 4K, for casual video
Enable iCloud Photos + Optimize Storage: biggest single space saver
Disable Live Photos for most shots (still capture moments when needed)
Delete duplicates and burst photos monthly
Empty Recently Deleted folder to reclaim space immediately
Backup to NAS, computer, or another cloud if iCloud is full
For batch conversion when needed: HEIC to JPG, Image Compressor