Guides

How to remove the location from a photo before selling online

Updated 31 October 2026

When you photograph something to sell, you're usually at home. Most phones save the GPS position in every photo, accurate to a few metres, so a listing photo can show buyers (and anyone else) where you live.

Does my photo have a location?

Probably, if location access is on for your camera app. The position is stored in the photo's EXIF metadata, along with the date and time and the phone model. You can't see it in the photo itself, but anyone with the file can read it.

To check, open the photo in our inspector. If it has a location, the first line of the report says so ("This photo reveals where it was taken…"), followed by the coordinates. The photo is read on your device; nothing is uploaded.

Don't marketplaces remove it?

Many large sites remove metadata from photos when you upload them, but not all do, and you can't easily check what a site keeps. Photos you send directly to a buyer, by email or as a file in a chat, usually arrive exactly as you sent them. Whether a messaging app keeps metadata depends on the app and how you send the photo.

The safe habit is to remove the location yourself before the photo leaves your device.

Remove the location

1. Open the cleaner.
2. Choose Location only to remove just the GPS position and place names, or Everything to remove all metadata. For a listing, everything is the better choice: buyers don't need the date, your phone model or its serial number either.
3. Add your photos. You can add many at once.
4. Download them one by one, or all together as a ZIP.

Each result lists what was removed, read back from the cleaned file, so you can see the location is gone. The pictures aren't recompressed, so they keep their full quality, and their orientation and colors are kept.

Stop your phone adding it

You can also turn off location for photos, so new photos never record it:

• iPhone: Settings → Privacy & Security → Location Services → Camera → Never. When you share a photo from the Photos app, you can also tap Options at the top of the share sheet and turn off Location for that share.
• Android: open the Camera app's settings and turn off the location option. On a Pixel it's Settings → More settings → Save location; on a Samsung Galaxy it's Location tags in the camera's settings. Other phones have a similar switch, under a similar name.

Turning it off only affects new photos. Photos you've already taken keep their location until you remove it.

Other things a listing photo can give away

The location isn't the only thing to think about:

• Thumbnails. A photo can carry a small preview of itself. If an app didn't update it after cropping, it can show what you cropped out. The cleaner removes it; more about hidden thumbnails.
• Serial numbers. Cameras often record their serial number, which can link photos posted under different names to the same camera.
• The picture itself. Metadata tools can't help with what's visible: house numbers, letters, windows with a view, reflections.