How Do You Remove GPS Location from a Photo?
A phone photo usually carries an invisible record: the coordinates where it was taken, the time, and the phone model. Send the original and that record goes with it.
What is actually hidden in a photo
Besides pixels, a digital photo carries a block of data called EXIF. When the camera app has location permission, it writes the latitude and longitude (sometimes altitude and heading) of where the shot was taken — precise enough to pick out a single building. It also records capture time, phone or camera model, lens settings, and on some cameras the body and lens serial numbers.
Take a photo at home and post it to a forum, a marketplace listing, or a chat with a stranger, and unless the platform cleans it for you, the other side can read all of that from the built-in photo info panel.
What tinysqueeze removes by default
| Data | Default | With “Keep photo info” |
|---|---|---|
| GPS location (coordinates, altitude, heading) | Removed | Removed |
| Body serial, lens serial, owner name | Removed | Removed |
| Maker notes, XMP, IPTC | Removed | Removed |
| Embedded thumbnail | Removed | Removed |
| Camera model, capture time, exposure | Removed | Kept |
| Color profile (e.g. iPhone Display P3) | Kept | Kept |
A color profile is not personal data — it only describes how the color values should be displayed. Removing it would make iPhone photos look dull on other devices, so it is always kept.
Step by step
- Open tinysqueeze and leave “Keep photo info” unchecked (the default).
- Drop in the photo or a whole folder and wait for compression to finish.
- Download the result and share that instead of the original.
- The original stays on your device, unmodified, and nothing is uploaded to a server.
If you do not want any visible quality change, choose the High quality preset. Location removal does not depend on compression strength; every preset does it.
How to verify it yourself
- macOS: open the output in Preview, choose Tools → Show Inspector, and check whether a GPS tab exists.
- Windows: right-click the file → Properties → Details, and check that the GPS section is empty.
- iPhone / Android: open the photo in the gallery and swipe up (or view details) to see whether a map location still appears.
Details that are easy to miss
- AVIF output never carries photo info, whether or not the keep option is checked.
- “Keep photo info” works for JPEG, PNG, WebP, and HEIC sources; images converted from camera RAW or TIFF carry none.
- Animated GIF, APNG, and animated WebP files keep their animation untouched, but any EXIF inside them is removed as well.
- If you need location for archiving or a map view, keep the original and share only the processed copy.
References
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