Remove EXIF data from your photos
See exactly what your images are leaking — GPS coordinates, timestamps, camera serial numbers — then strip it out. Everything runs inside your browser.
Drop images here or click to choose
JPEG, PNG and WebP — as many as you like
What your photos are actually carrying
Every photo taken with a phone or camera has a second layer of information stored alongside the pixels. It is called EXIF — Exchangeable Image File Format — and it was designed so photographers could keep track of their own shots. On a modern smartphone it typically records:
- GPS coordinates — often accurate to within a few metres of where you were standing
- Exact date and time, sometimes including the time zone offset
- Camera make, model and firmware
- Camera body and lens serial numbers on many DSLRs and mirrorless bodies
- Editing software and the machine or account name it was registered to
- Owner name and copyright fields if they were ever configured
Alongside EXIF, files often carry XMP blocks written by editing software, IPTC records used by news agencies, and embedded thumbnails. The thumbnail is worth a special mention: it is a separate small copy of the image, and it does not always get updated when the main picture is edited. There are well-documented cases of a cropped or blurred photo being published while the embedded thumbnail still showed the original, uncropped frame.
Why this matters in practice
The risk is rarely a single photo. It is the pattern across many. A handful of images posted over a few months, each with coordinates and timestamps, sketches out a home address, a workplace, a school run, a routine. Investigators, journalists and open-source researchers reconstruct exactly this kind of picture as a matter of routine, and the technique is not difficult.
Serial numbers create a second, quieter problem. Because the camera body serial is stable across every photo that camera ever takes, it links accounts that were meant to stay separate. An anonymous image and a personal one shot on the same body can be tied together with a single field comparison.
A common misconception: "social media strips it, so I'm fine." Large platforms usually do remove EXIF from the resized copies they serve publicly. But that protection disappears the moment a file travels any other way — sent as a document rather than a photo in a messaging app, attached to an email, shared through a cloud link, handed over on a USB stick, or uploaded to a smaller site that never implemented stripping.
How this tool removes it
Most online metadata removers upload your file to a server, process it there, and hand back a download. That means trusting an unknown operator with the exact images you were worried about in the first place — a slightly absurd trade.
MetaScrub does the work in your browser instead. The file is read into memory by JavaScript, the container is parsed, and the metadata segments are cut out. Nothing is transmitted. You can confirm this yourself: open your browser's developer tools, switch to the Network tab, and process a file — you will see no upload request. You can also disconnect from the internet after the page loads and the tool will keep working.
The removal is lossless. For JPEG files the APP1, APP13 and comment segments are dropped from the byte stream while the compressed scan data is copied across untouched — no re-encoding, so no generational quality loss. PNG files have their tEXt, iTXt, zTXt, eXIf and tIME chunks removed. WebP files have their EXIF and XMP chunks removed and the container flags corrected so the result stays valid.
What is not removed
Being precise about limits matters more than sounding reassuring:
- Visible content is untouched. A street sign, a reflection, a window view or a document on a desk is part of the image itself. Metadata removal does nothing about any of it, and visible detail is how most photos actually get located.
- Filenames are not metadata.
IMG_20240815_Baku_office.jpgtells a story on its own. Rename before sharing. - Some formats hide more. RAW and DNG files carry extensive maker-note data in proprietary structures and are not read here. For iPhone HEIC photos, run them through the HEIC to JPG converter first, then strip the JPG here.
- Screenshots can leak too — through notification banners, open tabs, clock and battery state, and account names in menu bars.
Frequently asked
Is it really free, and what is the catch?
The tool is free and has no upload limits. The site is supported by advertising on the surrounding pages. Because processing is local, serving you costs nothing beyond static hosting, which is why there is no paywall or account.
Can you recover metadata after removal?
Not from the cleaned file — the bytes are gone. But your original is untouched on your device, so keep it if you need the information. Photographers often want to keep GPS and camera data in their archive and strip it only from copies they publish.
Does this work on my phone?
Yes. It runs in mobile browsers the same way. Large batches of high-resolution files use more memory, so very old devices may struggle with dozens at once.
Why does the file size barely change?
Metadata is usually a few kilobytes against several megabytes of image data. A small change is expected and does not mean the removal failed — check by re-uploading the cleaned file to this page.
How do I verify it worked?
Drop the cleaned file back into the tool: it should report no metadata found. For an independent check, use exiftool on the command line, or your operating system's file properties dialog.
More tools and guides
HEIC to JPG converter
Turn iPhone HEIC photos into ordinary JPG files, without uploading them anywhere.
PDF metadata remover
Strip author names, software fingerprints and timestamps from PDF documents.
Word to PDF
Convert .docx files to PDF in your browser. Metadata is detected and stripped automatically.
PDF to Word
Extract text from PDFs and save as editable .docx files — no upload, no server.
What is EXIF data?
A plain-language explanation of what is stored and how it is read.
Do social networks strip EXIF?
Platform by platform — and the situations where the answer is no.
Redacting documents properly
Why black boxes over text keep failing, and what actually works.