The Storage Drain
By default, the iPhone Camera app enables a feature called “Live Photos.” When you press the shutter button, the camera actually records 1.5 seconds of high-resolution video before and after the shot, combining them into a moving picture. While fun for action shots or photos of pets, Live Photos consume roughly double the storage space of a standard still photograph. If you primarily take photos of documents, static landscapes, or food, the video data is completely useless and rapidly destroys your iCloud storage capacity. While you can tap the Live Photo icon in the camera app to turn it off temporarily, it will aggressively turn itself back on the next time you open the app. You must force the camera to remember your choice.
How to Turn Off Live Photo Permanently
You can force the Camera app to preserve your disabled settings via the Camera preferences.
- Open the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Scroll down the main list and tap on Camera.
- Tap on Preserve Settings.
- Scroll down to the bottom and locate the toggle switch labeled Live Photo.
- Toggle this switch to the On position (green). Note: This tells the phone to remember your last choice, not to force Live Photos on.
- Exit Settings and open the Camera app.
- Tap the Live Photo icon (the concentric circles at the top right) so it shows a slash through it, indicating it is off.
Static Photography
The change is now permanent. Because you instructed the iPhone to preserve your settings, the Camera app will never again automatically re-enable the moving picture feature. From now on, every time you open the camera, it will default to shooting standard, space-saving still photographs until you explicitly tap the icon to turn Live Photos back on.