Apple first moved to HEIC in 2017 with iOS 11 and it’s been the default photo format ever since. There are plenty of advantages to the HEIC format, including superior compression to save space on your phone, so Apple isn’t going to switch back, but fortunately, the company still makes it quick and easy to switch from HEIC to JPEG yourself if you are frustrated by HEIC. Here’s how to turn off HEIC on your iPhone in just a few easy steps.
How to turn off HEIC on your iPhone
- Open the Settings app.
- Go to Settings > Camera > Formats.
- Select Most Compatible, and you are done. All future images or videos you take will now be saved in JPEG. Turning off HEIC on your iPhone only helps with images you take in the future, it doesn’t convert your old images. To convert old images to JPEGs you should take a look at our guide to HEIC files on iPhone, which explains some of the advantages and disadvantages of the format in greater detail and covers the process for converting the photos to JPEGs on your macOS or Windows laptop. Even after years of using the iPhone you may not be using even a quarter of its amazing features, so if you are interested in more tips on how to improve your iPhone we’ve got a number of handy articles on the subject including some time-saving iPhone tricks, iPhone customization tips, and for a little fun we have iPhone features that look like magic.
