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HOW TO AVOID ACCIDENTALLY PLACING PHOTOS IN THE ICLOUD SHARED PHOTO LIBRARY

Apple added the iCloud Shared Photo Library in iOS 16, iPadOS 16, and macOS Ventura, dramatically improving sharing photos and videos with a group of people with whom you frequently exchange media. Shared Library, as it appears in the Photos app, is a kind of supercharged shared album that you might use with your family or a close friends group.

However, it is usually the case we want to be circumspect about what we share: not every picture we take is one we want even a select group to see. Because of how the Shared Library is integrated into the iOS and iPadOS Camera app, it can be easy to drop a private photo into the group pool.

In the Camera app, a tiny icon of two people in a circle in the upper-left corner (portrait) or lower-left (landscape) marks whether an image or video will land in the Shared Library when captured. If there’s a line through it, the image is not being shared; if the yellowish color of the Camera interface and filled in, it will be. If you tap the icon when it’s off (line through), it lights up yellow, and a “shared library” rectangular label briefly appears in an overlay.

You can change this as a preview via Settings → Camera → Shared Library or Settings → (Apps →) Photos → Shared Library → Sharing from Camera. There, you can enable or disable Share from Camera, which is set to Share Manually by default. Disable Share from Camera, and the icon no longer appears in the Camera app.