How to retrieve photos from an inactive iPhone?

I took some photo's with my old inactive Iphone, but they won't save to the camera roll. How can I save the pics to the camera folder?


[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Original Title: my inactive iphone will not save photos from the camera

iPhone 12, iOS 17

Posted on Oct 3, 2025 7:24 AM

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Posted on Oct 5, 2025 10:24 AM

What do you mean by inactive? Do you mean it's not connect to a phone carrier? If that's the case you should be able to open it and check the storage in the General settings as rasmee209 mentioned. the following should work:


Try connecting the old iPhone to your Mac with its charging cable. Then launch Image Capture. With Image Capture (IC) you can select and download photos from a iPhone to anywhere you'e like, i.e. a folder on the Desktop. It will also let you delete those photos from the iPhone.


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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 5, 2025 10:24 AM in response to srvcoldshot

What do you mean by inactive? Do you mean it's not connect to a phone carrier? If that's the case you should be able to open it and check the storage in the General settings as rasmee209 mentioned. the following should work:


Try connecting the old iPhone to your Mac with its charging cable. Then launch Image Capture. With Image Capture (IC) you can select and download photos from a iPhone to anywhere you'e like, i.e. a folder on the Desktop. It will also let you delete those photos from the iPhone.


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How to retrieve photos from an inactive iPhone?

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