How to Keep iPhone XR and XS Live Photos Off By Default
Maybe you’ve never owned an iPhone before. Maybe you decided to set up your iPhone XS or iPhone XR as a brand new phone instead of restoring your old iPhone’s settings. Either way, you open the Camera app and find that instead of shooting regular photos, every image you capture is a moving Live Photo.
“How do I make this stop?” you might yell in a fit of rage.
I’ve seen it happen with my own eyes, which is why I have an incredibly easy way to keep Live Photos from turning on by default every single time you open your iPhone Camera app.
MORE: How to Use Portrait Mode on the iPhone XS Front Camera
Live Photos capture a few seconds of motion and sound at the beginning and end of each shot. While it's a nice feature under the right circumstances, not every photographic moment lends itself to a Live Photo, and the images take up more space than a standard shot.
To turn off Live Photos, tap the yellow circle at the top of the Camera apps interface, turning it white. Live Photos are now disabled. Here's what you can do to make sure that preference sticks. —Caitlin McGarry
1. Open the Settings app.
2. Select Camera.
3. Tap Preserve Settings.
4. Toggle on the Live Photo setting, which is turned off by default. Turning this setting on will preserve the setting you chose for Live Photos in the Camera app.
Once this setting is enabled, if you have Live Photos off and then swipe the Camera app closed, the mode will remain off when you launch the camera again. If you leave Live Photos turned on when you close the app, it will still be on when you open it.
It’s a little thing, but one that causes headaches for new iPhone owners who don’t want every photo they take to be a live one.