iPhone Privacy Settings: What to Keep On, What to Turn Off
The iPhone has dozens of privacy controls scattered across different menus, and most people never touch them after setup. Some of these settings genuinely protect your device and data; others exist mainly to benefit advertisers and app developers. Knowing which is which makes the difference between a phone that works for you and one that quietly works against you.
Settings Worth Keeping On
Find My iPhone
This one should stay enabled no matter what. It’s found under Settings > [your name] > Find My > Find My iPhone, and it’s the feature that lets you locate, lock, or wipe a lost or stolen device. Turning it off might seem like a privacy win, but it actually removes your only way of recovering a missing phone or protecting the data on it if it falls into someone else’s hands.
App Privacy Report
Buried in Settings > Privacy & Security > App Privacy Report, this feature shows exactly when apps have accessed sensitive data like your location, photos, camera, or contacts, and which domains they’ve contacted while doing so. It’s off by default, but switching it on gives you a clear picture of what’s happening behind the scenes. If an app you barely use is quietly reaching out to unfamiliar domains every day, this is where you’ll spot it.
On the same topic: iPhone Security Settings You Should Change Right Now, How to Back up Your iPhone – Working Methods and The Best VPN Services for Streaming and Privacy.
iPhone Privacy Settings to Turn Off
Not every iPhone privacy setting is there to help you. Several exist to make tracking and advertising easier for third parties, and disabling them has little to no downside for everyday use.
Allow Apps to Request to Track
Under Settings > Privacy & Security > Tracking, this toggle controls whether apps can even ask for permission to track your activity across other companies’ apps and websites. Turning it off stops those pop-ups altogether and prevents cross-app tracking at the source, rather than leaving you to decline each request individually.
Personalized Ads
Apple’s own advertising system uses data tied to your Apple ID and device activity to serve targeted ads. If you’d rather not have your behaviour feed into that system, go to Settings > Privacy & Security > Apple Advertising and switch Personalized Ads off. This doesn’t reduce the number of ads you see in Apple’s apps, but it stops them from being tailored to your activity.
Precise Location (for most apps)
Many apps ask for your exact GPS coordinates when they only need a general sense of where you are. A weather app, a local news app, or most retail apps work perfectly well knowing you’re in a particular city or neighbourhood rather than your exact street. Precise Location can be turned off on a per-app basis within Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services by tapping into each app and disabling the toggle. Keep it on for apps that genuinely need accuracy, like maps or ride-hailing services, and switch it off everywhere else.
Managing Location Services Properly
Location access deserves more attention than a single on/off switch. Under Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services, you can review every app that has requested access and set it individually to Never, Ask Next Time, While Using the App, or Always. Most apps don’t need constant background access, so “While Using the App” is usually the right middle ground — it allows the feature to work when you’re actively using the app, without letting it track your movements when the screen is off.
A few categories worth checking specifically:
- Social media apps rarely need anything beyond “While Using the App,” and some don’t need location at all unless you’re tagging posts.
- Shopping and food delivery apps typically only need your location at checkout or during an active order.
- Utility apps like flashlight or calculator tools should have location set to Never — there’s no legitimate reason for them to request it.
A Practical Approach to iPhone Privacy Settings
Going through every single privacy setting at once can feel overwhelming, so it helps to prioritise. Start with Find My iPhone to make sure it’s on, then move to Tracking and turn off the ability for apps to even request tracking permission. From there, work through Location Services app by app, disabling Precise Location where it isn’t needed and tightening access levels where appropriate. Finish by checking Apple Advertising and turning off Personalized Ads if you’d rather keep that data out of the loop.
Once the main settings are in place, turn on App Privacy Report and let it run for a week or two. It won’t change anything on its own, but it gives you visibility into what your apps are actually doing, which makes it much easier to spot anything that looks out of place later on.
Final Thoughts
None of these changes require technical expertise — just a few minutes spent in the Settings app. The goal isn’t to lock everything down to the point where apps stop working properly, but to make deliberate choices about what data leaves your phone and who gets to see it. Review these settings now, and it’s worth revisiting them every so often, since iOS updates occasionally introduce new toggles or reset preferences during major version changes.
