Photo: Khamosh Pathak
Back when it was first released, we called Live Text the best new feature in iOS 15, and it’s not hard to see why—the tool can recognize any text in any photo (or within the camera view) so you can copy and share it. But the more we use it, the more annoying we find it can be. When you’re in the camera view, for example, and you point your camera toward something that you want to capture, you tap the subject to focus, and instead, your iPhone selects some text. Similarly, when you’re browsing your photo library, you may try to zoom into a picture, and instead, you get a pop-up asking if you’d like to navigate to an address instead.
If you’re similarly annoyed, you can disable the Live Text feature in the camera view, in the Photos app, and everywhere on the Mac, as well.
How to disable Live Text in Camera view on iPhone and iPad
Let’s deal with the most annoying part first. If Live Text gets in the way of your photography, you can disable it only for the Camera app. Go to Settings > Camera and disable the “Show Detected Text” feature.
How to disable Live Text everywhere on iPhone and iPad
If you want to disable the text recognition feature across the board, there’s a separate setting. This option will disable the feature in the Photos app, and in places like Safari, or the screenshot editor (where you can use Live Text on any image). To do this, go to Settings > General > Language & Region and disable the “Live Text” feature.
Once you disable the Live Text feature from here, it’s disabled everywhere, including the Camera app.
How to disable Live Text everywhere on Mac
macOS Monterey brought Live Text to the Mac, helping you simply select and copy text from any image. But if you’re not a fan, you can disable it across the entire OS: Click the Apple icon from the top menu bar, go to “System Preferences” > Language & Region > General, and from the “Live Text” section, disable the “Select Text in Images” feature.
If you change your mind, you can always go back to System Preferences to enable the feature.
