Guide: force iPhone to take JPEG photos instead of HEIC and avoid compatibility issues

August 1, 2018

With iOS 11 Apple introduced the HEIC/HEIF image format to reduce the size of each photo by 50% without compromising quality. Compared to the JPEG format, the HEIF format is more efficient and offers a unique way to manage photo storage. The only problem with this format is that it is not supported by all devices yet. However, you can prevent your iPhone from "shooting" photos in HEIC format in either iOS 11 or iOS 12.

The latest versions of iOS allow us to switch from the HEIF format to the more familiar and more compatible format, which is JPEG. So, when you want to transfer photos to your computer or edit them with software that doesn't support this format, you can take advantage of iOS's ability to take photos in JPEG format only.

Let's take a detailed look at the process!

Save photos in JPEG format instead of HEIC on iPhone

We start by opening the "Settings" of our device.

We go down until we find the "Camera".

After entering the camera section we will see the "Formats" option.

We select the "Most compatible format".

From now on, iPhone will only take photos in JPEG format and videos in H.264 format. However, you can change these settings whenever you want.

Automatically convert iPhone/iPad photos to JPEG when transferring them to Mac/PC

The latest versions of iOS allow us to automatically convert HEIC photos to JPEG when transferring them to a Mac or PC.

To do this, we open the "Settings" of our device again.

Above the Camera option we saw in the previous procedure, there is the "Photos" section. We select it.

We're going down. In "TRANSFER TO MAC OR PC" we select "Automatically".

That's it!

Although the HEIC format is not yet universally supported, we have to admit that it is the future. Essentially, the JPEG format is easy to use because it does not pose compatibility problems.

If questions have arisen during the process, we are at your disposal, down in the comments.