A photo can carry the place it was taken inside the file, alongside the picture, and that travels with it. One image you send can say more about where you were than any switch on your phone — which is why Google lists your photos among the places location data survives after you turn Timeline off.
Where the location lives
Apple describes how it gets there: when Location Services is turned on for the Camera app, it uses information known as metadata gathered from cellular, Wi-Fi, GPS networks and Bluetooth to determine the location coordinates where the photo or video is taken. Those coordinates sit with the file. Nothing about the image on screen shows you they are there.
Google Photos names two origins, and they behave differently at every later step. Your photo may have a location if your device's camera saves your location with the photo, or if you manually add a location to a photo; separately, Google Photos estimates a location from information such as landmarks and locations in your other photos. A camera location was recorded at the time. An estimate is Google's guess, made afterwards. Which one you have decides what you can do about it.
Which copy keeps it
Two copies are always in play: the one in your library, and the one you hand to someone else. Most settings change only one.
| What you do | The original in your library | The copy that leaves your phone | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Take a photo while the Camera has location permission | Holds the coordinates it was taken at | Holds them, unless you remove the location as you share | Apple — Photos location metadata |
| Share from Photos with Options › Location turned off | Untouched — keeps its location | Goes without it; Location Not Included appears above the Options button | Apple — Photos location metadata |
| Adjust Info › Adjust Location › No Location on the photo | The location is removed from that photo | Every copy after that goes without it | Apple — Photos location metadata |
| Share inside Google Photos — a new album, link or conversation | Untouched | No location details by default, other than for partner sharing | Google — Photos location data |
| A location Google Photos estimated for you | Stays on your copy; you can edit or delete it | Never shared, even when you choose to share location details | Google — Photos location data |
| A location your camera wrote into the file | Google Photos can't update or remove it | Shared as the location the camera provided | Google — Photos locations |
| Send the file some other way — mail, a chat app, an upload | Untouched | Not documented. Assume the location is still attached | Not documented, checked 2026-09-17 |
That last row is the one to take seriously. Instagram's and WhatsApp's help centres do not document what happens to the location stored in a file you upload or send — not that it is kept, not that it is removed. Where a company has said nothing, this site says nothing. Remove the location before the photo leaves, rather than trust that something removed it on the way. When the coordinates came from the camera, the only place to do that is the file itself, on the device that took it.
Turning it off for new photos
The cleanest fix is upstream: stop the camera recording the coordinates at all. Apple's step is Settings › Privacy & Security › Location Services › Camera, then Never. The photos and camera page here carries that path and the Android equivalent, each with its vendor page behind it.
That changes nothing about the photos already in your library; they keep what they were given on the day. Clear those one at a time with Adjust Location, or share them with Location turned off in the share sheet.
What no setting removes
The picture itself. A street sign, a school crest, a number on a door, the view from one particular window, the same corner of the same room across twenty photos — none of that is metadata, and no switch strips it. Apple's and Google's controls act on the coordinates stored with the file; whatever is in the frame stays in the frame.
So the last check before you send a photo is not a setting. It is looking at the photo.
Checked 2026-09-17 against: Apple — Manage location metadata in Photos (Personal Safety User Guide), Google — Understand, find & edit your photos' locations, Google — How Google Photos protects your location data, Google — Manage your Google Maps Timeline · read 2026-09-17