Remove EXIF data from a photo
EXIF is the block a camera writes into the file: model, lens, serial number, exposure, timestamps, and — on phone photos — usually the coordinates. This clears all of it, and keeps the rotation flag so your portrait photos don't fall over.
What EXIF is
EXIF is a text block that cameras have been writing into photo files since 1995. It was designed to help software develop the image correctly — and it records far more than that.
In a JPEG it lives in one segment near the top of the file. In a PNG it is an
eXIf chunk. In a WebP it is a RIFF chunk called EXIF. Different
containers, same idea: a structured list of named values riding along with your picture.
Which ones identify you
| Group | Fields | Risk |
|---|---|---|
| Location | GPSLatitude, GPSLongitude, GPSAltitude, GPSDateStamp | Highest. On a home photo this is your address. |
| Device | Make, Model, LensModel, BodySerialNumber, LensSerialNumber | High. A serial number is effectively a device fingerprint, and it persists across photos even when the location doesn't. |
| Time | DateTimeOriginal, CreateDate, ModifyDate | Medium alone, high combined with other files. |
| Identity | Artist, Copyright, CameraOwnerName, OwnerName | Medium — and the one case where removing it can have legal consequences on someone else's work. |
| Software | Software, HostComputer, ProcessingSoftware | Low alone. A small hint about your setup and workflow. |
| Imaging | ExposureTime, FNumber, ISO, FocalLength, Flash | Low. Usually the harmless part — and the reason people say EXIF is "just camera settings". |
Orientation: the one field you should keep
Phones almost never rotate the pixels. They store the photo the way the sensor read it and
attach a single field, Orientation (tag 0x0112), saying "turn this
90° clockwise when displaying".
Delete the whole EXIF block and the viewer has no instruction — so a portrait photo taken on a phone comes out on its side. Many "EXIF removers" do exactly this, and the user blames their phone.
This tool reads the orientation before stripping and writes back a minimal EXIF segment containing that one value and nothing else — 34 bytes, no camera, no lens, no location.
If a file has no rotation flag, nothing is written back. If you would rather remove everything including the rotation flag, you can — it will warn you first.