How to stop your phone putting your location in photos
One setting in the camera decides whether every photo carries GPS coordinates. Here is where it is on iPhone, Pixel and Samsung.
Why turn it off at the camera
Removing location from each photo before you share it works, but it relies on you remembering every time. The camera setting keeps location out of new photos in the first place. You can still remove it from photos you already took, which is covered further down.
iPhone and iPad
Go to Settings, Privacy & Security, Location Services, Camera and choose Never. Apple's guide says location metadata can be collected only if the Camera app has access to Location Services, so with Never it cannot be.
Google Pixel
Open the Camera app, tap Settings at the bottom left, then More settings, and turn off Save location. Google's Pixel Camera help says photos and videos then no longer carry location data.
Samsung Galaxy and other Android phones
Open the camera's settings and turn off Location tags on a Samsung. Google's help lists the other names: Store location data (OnePlus), Geographic locations (Vivo) and Save location info (Xiaomi). Phone makers move these settings around between versions, so if you cannot find it, search the camera settings for "location".
What you lose
Google notes that photos without a location may not appear in Google Photos' map view, location searches or trip-based Memories. Turning the setting back on later restores it for new photos only. Apple lists no such trade-off for iPhone in the guide above, but apps that sort photos by place will not have a place to sort by.
Photos you already took still have it
The setting is not retroactive: earlier photos keep the location they recorded. To clean them, follow the iPhone or Android guide, or drop them on the EXIF remover, which shows what each photo contains and removes the metadata from JPG, PNG and WebP without re-compressing the picture (except a sideways JPG, if you leave Apply orientation ticked). Everything happens inside your browser tab, so the photos never leave your device.
Check a new photo
Take a photo and drop it on the EXIF viewer: with the setting off, it should show no GPS location. If it still does, the photo came from another app or an older file. For the full list of fields, read what EXIF data is.
Questions
Does turning off location tags hide where my old photos were taken?
No. It only affects new photos. Remove the location from older ones with the EXIF remover.
Is turning off geotagging the same as turning off Location Services?
No. On an iPhone you can set only the Camera to Never and leave Location Services on for maps. On Pixel and Samsung the setting lives in the camera app.
Do other camera apps follow this setting?
The settings above are for the phone's own camera. Other camera apps have their own options, so check a photo from them with the EXIF viewer.
Will the date and phone model still be in the photo?
Yes. These settings control location. The date, device and camera settings stay until you remove them with the EXIF remover.