Why you can't delete some photos on your iPhone

The photos came from a computer

If you ever connected your iPhone to a Mac or PC and synced photos through Finder, iTunes or the Apple Devices app, those photos live in albums the computer controls. Apple says you cannot delete them directly from your device in the Photos app, and that a grey Trash button may mean you need to stop syncing photos from your computer.

To remove them:

1. Connect the iPhone to the computer you synced from.
2. Select the iPhone in the Finder sidebar, or in the Apple Devices app on Windows, and open the Photos tab.
3. Deselect the albums you no longer want on the phone, or turn off photo syncing entirely, and click Apply or Sync.

Apple's syncing article explains that each sync makes the phone match the computer, so the photos disappear from the phone once they are no longer selected. Synced photos also are not uploaded by iCloud Photos, which is why they often look different from the rest of your library.

The photo is in a shared album

Shared albums hold copies of photos posted by everyone you share with. You can delete the photos you added, while the album owner can remove anyone's. If a photo there is not yours and you are not the owner, ask the person who posted it, or leave the album. Removing a shared album photo does not affect anyone's personal library.

The photo is in a Shared Library

In an iCloud Shared Photo Library, anyone in the library can delete items. But Apple notes that only the person who added a photo or video can permanently delete it or recover it from Recently Deleted. If something keeps reappearing, check whether you are viewing the Shared Library or your Personal Library, and talk to the contributor.

Deleted, but not gone

Photos you delete sit in Recently Deleted for 30 days. If you deleted something and still see it in a search or a memory, give it a moment to refresh. If you want it gone everywhere now, empty that album; our guide to permanently deleting photos shows how.

Photos you received in Messages are another source of confusion. They appear in the conversation rather than your Library unless you saved them, so deleting them means deleting the attachment in Messages. See large message attachments.

When none of that applies

Check whether the photo is actually a duplicate of one that came from a sync. A synced copy and an iCloud copy of the same picture can sit side by side, and only one of them will delete.

Restart the iPhone and try again. Make sure there is a little free space, check that iOS is up to date, and if iCloud Photos is on, let the library finish syncing on Wi-Fi. If deletions still fail across your whole library, Apple Support can look at it with you.

If the goal is freeing space rather than removing one stubborn photo, checking your storage and our guide to storage that stays full after deleting photos are better places to start.