How to Convert "Live" Photos to Still Photos on an iPhone

Mar 17, 2021

Live photos are great! And sometimes a "live" photo is exactly what we want when we're taking a photo. Often, however, we mistakenly have the "live" photo feature turned on our iPhone when we really meant to take a normal, still photo.

What is a "live" photo on an iPhone?

A live photo is basically a very short video. When you take a "live" photo, your iPhone captures about 2 seconds of video as a photo.

Live photos are cool, but they're hard to share and they take up more space because they are bigger file sizes.

In this guide, we'll walk you through turning those live photos into still photos.

iPhone

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Search through your Photos app on your iPhone to locate the "live" photo you wish to convert.

When scrolling through the individual photos, you'll know which are "live" because the photos will move and you'll see this icon.

Once you've selected the live photo you want to make into a regular photo:

Click Edit at the top right to open the photo editor.
Select the "live" photo icon in the bottom menu.
Choose which part of the "live" photo you want to convert to a still photo by scrolling through the short video.
Turn the photo off of "live" by clicking the "Live" photo icon at the top of the screen.