How to Delete Wallpaper on iPhone 14

When the Lock Screen gallery on your iPhone 14 is crowded with old wallpapers, or one of them shows a photo you would rather not have on the phone’s face, you can delete it in a few seconds: touch and hold the Lock Screen, swipe up on the wallpaper, tap the trash icon, and confirm. Before you do, it helps to know what that removes and what it leaves alone.

What deleting a wallpaper removes, and what stays

On iOS 16 and later (every iPhone 14 runs at least iOS 16), a “wallpaper” in the gallery is more than a picture. Each one is a saved Lock Screen setup: the image or photo set, the clock style, any Lock Screen widgets, and the Home Screen wallpaper paired with it. Deleting it removes that whole setup from the gallery.

Item	After you delete the wallpaper
The Lock Screen design (clock style, widgets, filters)	Gone from the gallery
The Home Screen wallpaper paired with it	Expect it to go too, since the two are saved as a pair
The original photo in the Photos app	Still in your library; guides covering this agree it is not touched, though Apple’s page does not say either way
A Focus that was linked to that wallpaper	The Focus itself is not deleted; link another wallpaper to it if you want the screen to keep changing
Your other saved wallpapers	Unchanged

So if the goal is privacy, deleting the wallpaper only takes the photo off your Lock Screen and Home Screen. To remove the picture from the phone entirely, delete it in the Photos app as well. If the goal is just a shorter gallery, deleting is safe for your photos.

Delete a wallpaper from the Lock Screen gallery

These steps work on iOS 16 and later.

1. Press the side button to wake the iPhone to the Lock Screen. Stay on the Lock Screen; do not swipe up to the Home Screen.
2. Touch and hold an empty part of the Lock Screen, then use Face ID or your passcode to open the wallpaper gallery. If Face ID does not recognize you, touch and hold again and enter your passcode.
3. Swipe left or right to the wallpaper you want to remove.
4. Swipe up on that wallpaper. A trash icon appears below it.
5. Tap the trash icon.
6. Tap Delete This Wallpaper to confirm.

Press the side button or tap the wallpaper you want to keep to leave the gallery.

You may need to switch wallpapers first

Guides that cover this flow report that the wallpaper currently in use cannot be deleted. If swiping up on the one you are wearing does nothing useful, tap a different wallpaper in the gallery to make it active, then open the gallery again and delete the old one.

If the trash icon never appears

• The gallery did not open: the iPhone has to recognize you first. Look at the screen for Face ID, or enter your passcode when prompted, then touch and hold again.
• You swiped sideways instead of up: left and right only move through the gallery. The trash icon appears only when you push the wallpaper itself upward.
• You are on the Home Screen: the gallery opens from the Lock Screen only, so lock the phone and start again.
• It is the active wallpaper: switch to another one first, as described above.
• A work or school iPhone: devices managed by an organization can restrict wallpaper changes. Ask whoever manages the phone.
• Still stuck: restart the iPhone and check Settings > General > Software Update for a pending update, then try again.

On iOS 15 and earlier there is no gallery. Apple says you set a new wallpaper in Settings and, to get rid of the old image, delete it in the Photos app. No iPhone 14 runs iOS 15 or earlier, since every model shipped with iOS 16, so this only matters on an older iPhone.

Keep the wallpaper but change what is on it

Deleting is the right move when you never want that setup again. If what bothers you is one part of it, editing is faster and keeps the widgets and clock style you already arranged.

What you want	Better choice	Where
Never see this design again	Delete	Gallery, swipe up, trash icon
Same widgets and clock, different photo	Customize	Gallery or Settings > Wallpaper, then Customize
Keep the Lock Screen, change only the Home Screen	Customize the Home Screen side	Settings > Wallpaper, Customize on the Home Screen preview
One or two photos in a rotating set are wrong	Edit the Photo Shuffle	Customize the Photo Shuffle wallpaper
A brand new look while keeping old ones	Add a new wallpaper	Settings > Wallpaper, Add New Wallpaper, or the plus button in the gallery

To customize, open the gallery or go to Settings > Wallpaper and tap Customize under the preview you want to change. Full walkthroughs for changing the photo, the Home Screen side, or both are in how to change the wallpaper on an iPhone.

Clear out a Photo Shuffle without deleting the whole wallpaper

A Photo Shuffle wallpaper rotates through a set of photos on a schedule: On Tap, On Lock, Hourly or Daily. If one picture in the rotation should not be there, you do not have to delete the whole wallpaper.

Third-party guides describe these steps, and the labels may differ slightly by iOS version:

1. Open the gallery and swipe to the Photo Shuffle wallpaper.
2. Tap Customize and choose the Lock Screen.
3. Tap the photo set control in the editor to see the photos in the rotation.
4. Select the photos you want out, remove them, and tap Done.

This works for photos you picked by hand. If the shuffle is built from an album or from automatic categories such as people or pets, the iPhone chooses the photos, and you may only be able to change the source rather than remove individual pictures. In that case, removing the photo from the album or picking a different source is the practical route.

Tidy a long list of wallpapers

There is no select all or batch delete in the gallery, so each wallpaper is removed with its own swipe and confirm. A few habits keep the list short:

• Keep a small set. Four or five saved Lock Screens are easy to swipe through; twenty are not.
• Edit before adding. When you want a new photo on a design you like, use Customize instead of creating another wallpaper.
• Use one Photo Shuffle for favorite photos rather than a separate wallpaper for each picture.
• Check Focus links before deleting. In the gallery, a Focus button on a wallpaper shows whether it is linked to a Focus, such as Work or Sleep. If you delete a linked one, link another wallpaper to that Focus so it still changes the screen. Managing the Focus itself is covered in how to turn off Focus on iPhone 14.

Deleting wallpapers frees very little storage, since the photos stay in your library, so tidy the gallery for convenience rather than space. For actual storage savings, removing unused apps does far more; see how to delete apps on an iPhone.

Check it worked, or rebuild one you deleted by mistake

To confirm, touch and hold the Lock Screen again and swipe through the gallery. The deleted design should no longer be in the row.

There is no undo for Delete This Wallpaper. If you removed one by mistake, rebuild it:

1. Open Settings > Wallpaper and tap Add New Wallpaper, or tap the plus button in the gallery.
2. Choose Photos and pick the same picture, which is still in your library, or choose the same Apple wallpaper from its collection.
3. Re-add your widgets and clock style, then tap Add.
4. Choose Set as Wallpaper Pair to use it on both screens, or Customize Home Screen to give the Home Screen its own look.

If the original photo came from a cloud service, save it to the Photos app first; setting a wallpaper from Google Photos shows that route.

iPhone wallpaper questions

Can I delete a wallpaper from Settings instead of the Lock Screen?

Apple documents deletion from the Lock Screen gallery. Settings > Wallpaper is the place to customize or add wallpapers, so use the gallery when you want one removed.

Is it the same on iPhone 14 Plus, 14 Pro and 14 Pro Max?

Yes. Apple ties these steps to iOS 16 or later, not to a model, so every iPhone 14 model and newer iPhones use the same gallery.

If you are clearing out old wallpapers to start fresh, the next step is setting up the one you want to keep. Apple’s own pages cover deleting a wallpaper on iPhone and changing the wallpaper on iPhone.