How to Delete Attachments from Messages without Deleting the Conversation

By Sarah Kingsbury Mon, 07/17/2017

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All those cute pictures, funny memes, and hilarious gifs your friends send you in Messages can take up a surprising amount of your iPhone's storage capacity. Each attachment is saved to the message conversation thread, which is great if you decide to save a couple of the photos. But if you’re someone who doesn't often delete older messages, you can easily free up some phone storage by deleting the attachments. And luckily, you can delete attachments from Messages without deleting the conversation.

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How to Delete Attachments from Messages Without Deleting the Conversation

In Messages, open the conversation by tapping on it.
Tap the ‘i’ in the upper right corner (older iOS users will see Details instead of an ‘i’).
Scroll down to Images & Attachments and press and hold on one of the images or attachments. Then tap More.

Next, tap each attachment you want to delete. Once you've selected all the items you don't want, tap the trash icon to delete them.
Confirm Delete [#] Attachments. Tap Done.

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Author Details

Sarah Kingsbury

As the Editorial Director at iPhone Life, Sarah Kingsbury manages the online editorial team and oversees all website content. She is a long-time Apple enthusiast who never goes anywhere without her Apple Watch and owns way too many HomePods. Since joining iPhone Life in 2013, Sarah has done everything from writing hundreds of how-to articles to founding the Daily Tip newsletter. She even co-hosted the early episodes of the iPhone Life Podcast. When not at work, Sarah can be found hiking in the mountains and canyons around Las Vegas, where she lives with her partner and dogs.

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