Finding iPhone Lock Screen Image

January 11, 2023 10:31 AM

After the recent iOS 16 lock screen features update, my lock screen has been behaving very strangely and I want to find the image that I'm currently using for it on my phone, but can't.

I've been using this same lock screen image for years and have done transfers across several generations of iPhone without issue. It was working fine all this time until the recent iOS 16 update, which has caused the lock screen to be just black sometimes and act wonky in other ways (e.g., I'll get banner notifications, but they're sometimes gone when I check the lock screen, only to reappear normally later when the lock screen image is back).

I've been trying to find the image that I'm currently using on the phone so that I can go through the new lock screen procedure and hopefully fix these problems, but the image doesn't seem to be stored anywhere on the phone (or at least not in any of the Photos folders that I can see). It's obviously somewhere on the phone since it displays most of the time, and if I go to Settings > Wallpaper I can see the image as the current lock screen wallpaper, but there's no option to save it.

Does anyone know how to find the image currently being used for the lock screen on an iPhone? For reference, I am using a 2021 iPhone 13 Pro running iOS 16.1.1. Thanks for any advice anyone may have.

posted by star gentle uterus to Technology (8 answers total)

Oh my god, this is happening to me too and it’s making me so enraged. I spent hours in the new wallpaper settings place trying to fix it and to get my notifications to stop piling up on the bottom but I was reduced to tears and unable to get anything to work without losing the image I use on my Home Screen, which apparently is no longer on offer. Then my images both reappeared. I don’t understand it at all.

I’ll be watching this for any advice but I have to say, you’re not alone and I absolutely loathe what they’ve done with the settings. It’s completely fucked up.
posted by kitten kaboodle at 11:32 AM on January 11, 2023

I just tried this:
* Do a long press on your Lock Screen to get the Lock Screen options.
* Swipe left or right to find the one you're looking for.
* Click "Customize" at the bottom.
* Click the Lock Screen image on the left. It will maximize, and at the bottom right there's a ... icon.
* Click that, and it offers "Show Photo in Library".

Clicking that did the trick for me. Hope it helps!
posted by invincible summer at 11:37 AM on January 11, 2023 [2 favorites]

If the photo is no longer saved in your library, then you could save a non-encrypted backup to a Mac and then dig through the relevant files from the backup folders. This will be time consuming if you have a lot of other photos on the phone.
posted by Lanark at 11:42 AM on January 11, 2023

Response by poster: invincible summer, maybe I'm misunderstanding, but I can only get to step 3 on your suggestion. When I click "Customize", the only option that comes up is a prompt that reads "Customize New Wallpaper" under which is "Add a new wallpaper to made edits, add widgets, and switch between Lock Screens," with only "Add New" or "Cancel" buttons to select from. If I click "Add New" it brings up a list of options for adding new lock screen wallpapers, but nowhere do I see the option that you described:

* Click the Lock Screen image on the left. It will maximize, and at the bottom right there's a ... icon.

I suspect that this is because this image was ported over when I transferred from a previous phone rather than having been made on this one, but if I'm misunderstanding your instructions please let me know.
posted by star gentle uterus at 1:29 PM on January 11, 2023 [1 favorite]

Hhmmm yeah, I'm seeing that on any image that the phone seems to think is part of the system rather that something I added myself. Sorry that wasn't more helpful!
posted by invincible summer at 2:25 PM on January 11, 2023

Just chiming in to say you’re not alone. I did ascertain the wonkiness on mine only happens when I’m listening to something using a Bluetooth device.
posted by outfielder at 4:40 PM on January 11, 2023

I've been through this and unless I and all the forum posters I read have missed something, there is no way to do this. That Lock Screen image isn't saved anywhere that you can get at, if you don't already have it in Photos.
posted by fabius at 5:25 AM on January 12, 2023

I had a flavor of this - only I could see the photo, select it, and have a blank wallpaper screen with that image not displaying. Thanks for posting, I have some leads.
posted by childofTethys at 6:10 AM on January 12, 2023