How to delete photos from instagram library

How can I delete my Instagram photos?

Magdalena Poprawa

27 February 2017

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Sometimes you post a picture on Instagram and after several minutes (days, or even years!) you change your mind and want to delete it. Thankfully, Instagram makes this easy to do.

Go to Instagram on your smartphone.
Click your profile button at the bottom of the screen.
Review your photos and tap the one you want to delete.
Tap the options icon (three dots in the right-hand corner of the screen).
Tap ‘Delete’.
Confirm the deletion.

You can do this with as many pictures as you want but it’s still not possible to delete more than one post at the same time.

It is also possible to delete a tag of yours on someone’s photo. You can do it like this:

Go to Instagram on your smartphone.
Click your profile button at the bottom of the screen.
Review your photos and tap the one you want to remove a tag from.
Tap your name on it.
After a box appears, tap ‘Remove me from photo’.
Tap ‘Done’.

And that’s it. To mass untag photos, tap the three dots in the top right corner of the ‘Tags’ menu, then tap ‘Hide Photos’.

Remember that there is no way to delete Instagram photos from your profile on a laptop or other PC. If you want to delete a post, you have to do so from the app on your mobile device.

Analyze before you delete

Apart from your personal feelings, consider if deleting a post is actually beneficial. Maybe you had significant engagement under it? Maybe users liked it and it was something valuable?

Before deleting content, always try to analyze it before. Check how this specific post performed. Compare its performance to other posts. Monitor if users are often coming back to it… and so on, and so on…

Don’t delete, archive

It may obviously happen that for some reason you will no longer want to see some posts on your profile. Maybe your post is eventually not performing well? Or an offer presented in a post is no longer valid? Or you just changed your mind and don’t want it to be there?

It’s all understandable. But what we want to pay your attention to is the possibility to archive posts instead of deleting them.

The first reason is that you may simply change your mind again 😉 And there will be no coming back if you delete a post. If you archive it, however, you will find all such posts in the archive section and you can easily show them on your profile again anytime.

The second reason is, however, more important. Instagram’s algorithm doesn’t like deleting content, especially if it happens often. Such activity is something unusual for it and once you delete your content it has to learn your behaviors again.

For other users it simply doesn’t matter if you archive a post or delete it – they simply no longer see it. But for your profile’s performance, it does matter a lot.

Read also:

How do I take great Instagram photos?
What analytic tools for Instagram can I use?
Can I schedule my posts on Instagram?

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Author

Magdalena Poprawa

Content Marketer

Law and communication design student, in love with social media law, coffee and Disney movies.

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How to delete a picture or video from an Instagram carousel

The ability to stuff multiple pictures into a single Instagram post is incredibly useful, especially because most of us don’t have the time, energy, or money to commit to daily curated posting like the most successful influencers. What can be complicated is figuring out how to delete one of those images when it no longer belongs in an existing photo dump.

So if you’ve fallen out of love with a picture (or a person) in one of your posts, but haven’t trashed it because you like the other photos, it’s time you learned how to excise that malignant memory like a skilled social media surgeon.

How to delete a photo or video from an Instagram carousel

For those unfamiliar with the term, a carousel is a single Instagram Post that features two to 10 images or videos. (Given the amount of people who search “how to delete one picture out of multiple on Instagram” and other overly complicated phrases, we understand if you call these posts something different.) Carousels have been around since 2017, but the ability to delete one photo without killing all of them took Instagram four more years to release.

One catch: you can’t delete one image from a two-photo carousel, potentially because that would make it a single-item post and mess with something inside Instagram, though we can’t say for sure. These steps will only work with a post stocked with at least three pieces of media.

Step 1: Go to the post and tap the three dots in its top right corner.
Step 2: When the options menu appears, ignore the bright red “delete” option and hit Edit.
Step 3: Swipe to the image or video you want to send to the trash.
Step 4: Tap the little trash can icon in the top left corner of the image. If you can’t see this, scroll up, as the app defaults to editing the post caption. If you still can’t see it, you’re likely working in a two-picture post.

Where there’s smoke, there’s the trash can icon (at least in this carousel photo). Chelsey Coombs

Step 5: Instagram will ask if you really want to scrap it, and you do, so hit Delete to confirm. Your problematic post has been cleansed.
Step 6: Hit Done (iOS) or the blue check (Android) in the top right to save your changes.

Instagram’s post editing feature also lets you add and edit tags, the alt text, location, and caption. Unfortunately, you currently can’t use the Edit button to change the order of photos in a carousel post after it goes live, or add images or video at a later date.

How to recover deleted photos or videos on Instagram

Any deleted items will hang out in a folder deep within your settings for 30 days. If you change your mind, you can recover them before that time runs out. Or you can go in and delete them permanently so you’re not tempted to restore them in the future.

To find these discarded pics in their purgatorial location, go to your main Instagram profile page and follow the steps below.

Step 1: Tap the three lines in the top right corner.
Step 2: Go to Your activity.
Step 3: Scroll down and tap Recently deleted.

Instagram doesn’t make this easy to find, but it’s there.

Chelsey Coombs

Step 4: Tap on the image you want to revive
Step 5: Hit the three dots in the top right.
Step 6: Choose one of the two available options: Restore and Delete. Deleting anything from the Recently Deleted folder will erase it forever, while restoring it will put it back where it was—kind of.

We say “kind of” because if you delete an image from a carousel and then restore it, the photo won’t go back to its original spot in the lineup. It’ll show up at the very end. This may not matter, but if you’ve carefully curated a group of pictures to tell a specific story or exude a certain aesthetic, this could ruin that. And if that’s a problem for you, just reupload the whole batch—maybe you’ll get more likes this time around.

This story has been updated. It was originally published on November 20, 2021.

Using Shared Albums in the Photos app on iPhone, iPad, and Mac

Shared Albums allows you to share photos and videos only with selected users, who can also add their own photos, videos, and comments.

Preparation

Using Shared Albums on an iPhone or iPad

Using Shared Albums on a Mac

File types that can be used in Shared Albums

Shared Albums Storage Limits

Prepare

Turn on Shared Albums

On your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, go to Settings > [your name] > iCloud > Photos and turn on Shared Albums.
On a Mac, open the Photos app. From the menu bar at the top of the screen, choose Photos > Preferences. On macOS Monterey or earlier, choose Photos > Preferences. Click the iCloud tab, then select Shared Albums.
On Apple TV, go to Settings > Users & Accounts > iCloud and turn on Shared Albums.
On a Windows PC, open iCloud for Windows and select Photos. Click the Options button to make sure the Shared Albums option is enabled, and then click Apply. Learn more about using Shared Albums in iCloud for Windows.

If you are using earlier versions of iOS, iCloud for Windows, iPhoto, or Aperture, you can still create and view Shared Albums. In previous versions of iOS, macOS, tvOS, and iCloud for Windows, Shared Albums was called iCloud Photo Sharing.

Using shared albums on iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch

Creating a new shared album
Delete shared album
Inviting additional users
Deleting a subscriber
Adding photos and videos to a shared album
Deleting photos and videos from a shared album
Saving photos and videos from a shared album

Creating a new shared album

Go to the Albums tab and click the Add button.
Click New Shared Album .
Specify a name for the shared album and click Next.
Select the people you want to invite from Contacts, or enter an iMessage email address or phone number.
Click Create.

Deleting a shared album

Open a shared album.
Click the People button .
Click Delete Shared Album.

When viewing a list of shared albums, you can also click Edit, then click the Delete button to remove the shared album.

A deleted shared album is automatically deleted from all of your devices and those of your followers. If the Public Website setting is enabled, the shared album will be removed from the web as well. Deleting a shared album permanently deletes all the photos it contains. Before proceeding, make sure you have saved all the photos you need to keep.

Invite additional users

In the Albums section, select the shared album you created.
Click the People button .
Click "Invite Users".
Enter the usernames you want to share this album with.
Click Add.

To share an album with friends or family who don't use iCloud, open the shared album you created, go to the People tab, and turn on Public Website. Your photos will be published on a website that can be viewed by all users in any web browser of the latest version.

Delete a subscriber

Open the shared album.
Click the People button .
Select the subscriber you want to delete.
Click Remove Subscriber at the bottom of the screen.

User access to a shared album is controlled by its creator. You can remove subscribers at any time.

Add photos and videos to a shared album

On the Library tab or album, click Select, then select the photos and videos you want to share.
Click the Share button, then click Add to Shared Album.
Select the album where you want to share photos. Then click "Publish".

If you have a shared album open, you can also click the Add button to select photos and videos to add.

When new photos are added, users who have access to the shared album are automatically notified. To allow followers to add photos and videos too, turn on Allow followers to post. Click the More button and select Shared Album Details.

Remove photos and videos from the shared album

Open the shared album.
Click on a photo or video.
Click the "Cart" button.
Click Remove Photo.

The owner of a shared album can delete any photos, videos, or comments from any user. Subscribers can delete anything that they have personally added. Anything you delete is automatically removed from the album on all of your and your followers' devices.

Any photos you have saved or uploaded to your library from a shared album remain in your library even after the shared album is deleted or accessed.

Saving photos and videos from a shared album

When you share photos and videos with someone, they can save the shared items to their own library.

Click on a photo or video.
Click the Share button.
Click Save Image or Save Video.