When you unlocked your phone, did you ever see pictures of individuals or events you’d want to forget? With highlighted images and recollections, Apple hopes to bring back fond memories, yet this nostalgic journey might backfire. Together, these two iPhone functions produce “featured content” that draws attention to the moments you want to keep in mind. You may find yourself staring at pictures of your ex that you’d want to forget together with your best trip with pals.

However, the Photos app isn’t the only place to find this highlighted material. Featured material may be found on widgets on your home screen and on the search page, among other places on your device.

Having these unexpected photos randomly show up on your iPhone, especially if you’re showing something on your phone to someone, or someone else is using your phone, can become a headache… that you can luckily avoid. If you want to stop unwanted photos from randomly appearing across your iPhone, here’s how to stop it. While you’re here, check out the 7 changes you should make as soon as you install iOS 18 and how to disable the most annoying Apple Intelligence feature.

It may be annoying when these unexpected pictures appear on your iPhone at random, particularly while you’re showing someone something on it or when someone else is using it. Fortunately, you can eliminate this problem.

Here’s how to prevent unsolicited photographs from showing up on your iPhone at random.

While you’re here, learn how to turn off the most obnoxious Apple Intelligence feature and the seven adjustments you should make as soon as you install iOS 18.

You may choose to display someone less often or not at all.

iOS will consider someone to be significant in your life if they are shown very prominently across your picture collection. That individual will undoubtedly appear in your device’s displayed photographs and memories. Reliving priceless moments with your favorite people is a joyful experience for most individuals.

You probably don’t want to see that person’s face appear on your phone at random if you no longer speak to them and their possessions aren’t as valuable. Although it would take a lot of effort, you could go through your camera roll and remove all of the pictures and videos that include that individual. Thankfully, there is a simple method for hiding pictures of a certain individual.

Open the pictures app, locate a picture or video of the person you want to highlight less often, press the three-dot menu button in the top-right corner, and choose display This Person Less to display them less frequently or not at all in recollections, highlights pictures, and widgets.

There are now two alternatives available to you:

Feature This Person Less: If this person is in a group shot, they may still show up, but you won’t see any individual images or videos of them in recollections or featured photographs.
Never include This individual: No pictures or videos, including group shots, will ever include this individual.

How to make a person seem less prominent on your iPhone

use the first option if you still want to have group images shown on your smartphone; however, use the second option if you really don’t want to view that individual.
Additionally, memories and highlighted photographs may be fully disabled.
Now, not everyone’s surprising snapshot will include a former friend or spouse. You may want to remove all memories and feature photographs from your phone if you’re concerned about an embarrassing snapshot of yourself or anything rather indecent showing up on it.

Toggle off Show Featured Content under Apps > Photos in the Settings app. This will disable all of the device’s highlighted content, including as search results for photographs, widgets on your home screen, and albums in the photographs app.

iOS’s Featured Content setting
Featured photographs and memories will be replaced with a gray box that reads, “Featured Content is Turned Off.”

Additional advice you may use to avoid unexpected pictures

Although the two tactics I mentioned above are a good place to start, there are additional things you can do to stop certain images from showing up on your device.Take the picture widgets off of your home screen and lock screen. There is a photographs widget that only displays highlighted images, which might be unwelcome or humiliating. Choose a picture widget that isn’t “featured” or just take them from your phone.
Use the Photos app to hide groupings. You may now hide certain collections that could preview images you don’t want to see, starting with iOS 18. Select Customize & Reorder under Photos, then mark out the collections you want to conceal. These collections include a variety of topics, such as People & Pets, Trips, and Recent Days. Some collections may be grayed out if you have deactivated highlighted content.

Shut off recollections of the holidays. You may go to Settings > Apps > Photos and turn off Show Holiday Events if you don’t want to view memories of recent holidays, such as Christmas or Thanksgiving.
Prevent images from showing up in search results. You could see pictures if you put anything into the search bar. Toggle off Show App in Search and Show Content in Search under Settings > Apps > Photos to prevent this from occurring.

On your lock screen, avoid selecting a featured wallpaper. Featured photographs that change throughout the day may be set as your lock screen on iOS 18. In order to prevent undesired photographs from showing up on your lock screen, choose a different wallpaper than the featured photos wallpaper.