How to Turn Burst Off on Your iPhone

Burst mode is a fun and underrated tool to help you take the best iPhone images from moving subjects. But it can also be a bit overwhelming, especially when the camera is constantly taking multiple photos in quick succession.

Fortunately, there are several ways to disable burst mode. By adjusting these settings, you can keep your phone’s storage free and prevent the iPhone from creating hundreds of random shots in rapid succession.

1. Turn off Use Volume Up for Burst

Burst mode is a great way to take a bunch of quick photos in a short period of time, but it can take up a lot of space on your iPhone and in iCloud. If you’re using burst mode often, you may want to look into ways you can turn it off so that you can free up some of that space and improve your photos.

The first step to turn off Use Volume Up for Burst is to open Settings and toggle on the Camera setting. This will disable the feature and allow you to only take burst shots with the on-screen shutter button instead.

Another option is to disable the camera timer, which adds a three or ten second delay to your photos. This can be useful if you’re taking group photos or trying to capture a scene with your iPhone on a tripod.

If you have a newer iPhone model, you can also enable an alternate method that allows you to take burst photos by pressing the physical up volume button. This works on all iOS devices and enables you to use the button for both burst mode and QuickTake video.

2. Turn off Auto Focus

Auto Focus on an iPhone is a handy feature that lets you take photos with the camera automatically setting the exposure and focus settings. However, sometimes it can cause problems when taking pictures of moving objects or things that are not in focus.

To get around this issue, you can use AE/AF Lock on your iPhone to keep the camera from automatically refocusing on something that isn’t in the picture. This is especially useful when taking pictures with moving elements in the background, such as people or cars passing behind your subject.

The iPhone also has a built-in macro mode that lets you take close-up shots of things like leaves and flowers. This tech was introduced in iOS 15 betas, but it’s now available to all users.

You can turn off Auto Focus on an iPhone by enabling AE/AF Lock on your device, or by disabling it from the Camera app. AE/AF Lock locks the focus and exposure values of your camera, which will prevent it from automatically switching between auto-focus and AF.

3. Turn off Timer

If you aren’t a fan of burst photos, you can easily turn the Timer off on your iPhone. This can help avoid a large number of photos from filling your phone’s storage and iCloud account.

To do this, simply open the Camera app and tap the big white button next to the physical home button. When you’re done, tap the HOME key to return to the main screen.

In the Camera app, you’ll see thumbnails of all of the photos that were taken during burst mode. These photos are stored in a special Bursts album that’s found in the Albums section of the Photos app.

These burst images can be viewed or transferred to your computer for back up. However, you can only view them if you’ve enabled the Bursts feature on your device.

This feature is not available on all iOS devices and may be disabled by default on your device. If you want to turn it on, make sure that the Live photo option or Portrait mode is turned off.

4. Turn off HDR

HDR is a photography feature that allows your iPhone to take multiple photos in quick succession, at different levels of exposure, and then combine them into one photo. It can help to even out the contrast in a landscape, or to make a bright subject look more detailed.

However, HDR also takes up more memory than regular photos, which can be a problem when you’re running low on storage space. To avoid this, you can turn off HDR on your iPhone when taking photos.

To turn off HDR on an iPhone, open the Camera app and tap the HDR icon at the top of the screen. If you don’t see this option, it’s probably because Smart HDR is on (Auto HDR on older iPhones).

You can also turn off Auto HDR by going to Settings -> Camera and then turning off the “Smart HDR” switch. You can then turn it back on from the Camera screen.

The main reason you want to turn off HDR is that it can be a bit of a nuisance, especially when it comes to high motion shots. It might blur your photos if the subject moves, and it can sometimes look overly processed.

5. Turn off Flash

All iPhones include a flash at the back of the phone, which is great for taking photos in low light situations. However, when you get a notification on your iPhone, the flash is activated, which can be very annoying at times.

If you want to disable the flash when you receive a text message or other alert on your phone, it’s easy to do. You can do this through the settings menu of your iOS device.

First, make sure that you’re in the Camera app, which will be open and in “Photo” or “Portrait” mode. Then, tap the flash icon, which looks like a lightning bolt.

Once you’ve tapped the flash icon, a small menu will appear. Tapping this will reveal three options: On, Auto, and Off.

In general, we recommend that you turn on your camera flash only when there isn’t enough ambient light to capture a good photo. This can prevent harsh lighting, shiny skin, and red eyes.

To turn off your camera flash, tap the flash icon again and select “Off.” Now the flash won’t activate with every photo you take, even in low-light situations. This is especially helpful if you use the Camera app for capturing nighttime events.