EXIF & GPS Cleaner — Read and Remove Photo Metadata (Lossless)

See what your photos reveal before you publish them, and remove it. For every image this Actor reports the hidden metadata (GPS location with a map link, phone or camera model, lens, serial numbers, author, date and time, editing software) with a clear list of privacy risks, and returns a clean copy with all of it removed, without recompressing: the pixels stay exactly the same. Works in bulk on JPEG, PNG and WebP.

Real output of this Actor on a Pixel 6 photo (photo: Mark Yasuda, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons).

Why use it

• 📍 Phones write your location into photos: anyone who downloads the original file can see where it was taken, often your home or workplace. This Actor finds and removes it.
• 🖼️ Truly lossless: metadata blocks are cut out of the file; the image data is copied byte for byte. Each run can verify that the decoded pixels are identical. No quality loss, no size growth.
• 🕵️ Removes what other tools miss: EXIF (including the embedded thumbnail), XMP, IPTC, comments, data appended after the image such as motion-photo videos, and extra embedded images.
• 🧭 Photos stay upright and true to color: only the orientation tag and the color profile are kept by default (both contain no personal data).
• 📊 Audit before you clean: report-only mode tells you which images in a set leak GPS, serial numbers or author names.
• 🔒 Runs inside the Actor: images are not sent to any third-party service.

Who uses it

Sector	Typical use
Marketplaces & classifieds	Strip seller locations from listing photos before they go live
Real estate	Publish property photos without the agent's or owner's device data
Journalism & NGOs	Protect sources and staff when publishing field photos
Companies under LGPD / GDPR	Remove personal data from images on websites, reports and shared drives
Apps & platforms with user uploads	Clean every uploaded photo through the API before storing it
Investigations & OSINT	Read dates, devices and locations from photos you are allowed to analyse
Photographers & agencies	Audit and remove serial numbers and GPS before delivering files

What it reports

Field	Meaning
privacyRisks	Plain list: GPS location, device serial number, author or owner name, date and time taken, camera / phone model, tagged people / face regions
gps	Latitude, longitude, altitude and a Google Maps link
camera	Make, model, lens and software
dateTaken	Original date and time
serialNumbers	Body / lens serial numbers, when present
authorInfo	Artist, copyright, owner, XMP creator, IPTC by-line, XMP city / location
hasExif, hasXmp, hasIptc, hasIccProfile	Which metadata blocks the file contains
allTags	Every EXIF, GPS and IPTC tag (optional)

Input

Field	Type	Default	Description
Image URLs (imageUrls)	array	—	Photos to process (JPEG, PNG, WebP; reading also works for TIFF and others). Up to 100 MB each. Google Drive and Dropbox links work
What to do (mode)	string	report-and-clean	report-and-clean, report or clean
Keep orientation (keepOrientation)	boolean	true	Keep only the rotation tag so photos are not shown sideways
Keep color profile (keepColorProfile)	boolean	true	Keep the ICC profile so colors look the same
Verify pixels are identical (verifyPixels)	boolean	true	Decode both files and confirm the image did not change
Include all tags (includeAllTags)	boolean	false	Add every raw EXIF, GPS and IPTC tag

{
  "imageUrls": ["https://example.com/listing-01.jpg", "https://example.com/listing-02.webp"],
  "mode": "report-and-clean"
}

Output

{
  "sourceUrl": "https://example.com/listing-01.jpg",
  "format": "JPEG", "width": 2587, "height": 1455,
  "hasGps": true,
  "gps": { "latitude": 47.369681, "longitude": -122.3108, "altitudeMeters": 98.4, "mapsUrl": "https://www.google.com/maps?q=47.369681,-122.3108" },
  "camera": { "make": "Google", "model": "Pixel 6", "lensModel": "Pixel 6 back camera 6.81mm f/1.85", "software": "HDR+ 1.0.414775603zd" },
  "dateTaken": "2022:01:01 09:27:56",
  "privacyRisks": ["GPS location", "date and time taken", "camera / phone model"],
  "cleanImageUrl": "https://api.apify.com/v2/key-value-stores/.../records/clean-00001.jpg",
  "originalBytes": 377989, "cleanBytes": 292298, "metadataBytesRemoved": 85691,
  "remainingRisks": [],
  "pixelsIdentical": true
}

Clean copies are stored in the run's key-value store and linked in cleanImageUrl. Failed images return an error field and are free.

Pricing

Pay per image processed (report and clean copy included), plus a tiny per-run start fee. No subscription. Apify plan discounts apply automatically (see the Pricing tab).

Example	Images billed
1 photo	1
500 marketplace listing photos	500
10,000 user uploads per month	10,000

Use it from code or an AI agent

Python: audit a folder of public URLs, then use the clean copies

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>")
run = client.actor("adorable_partial/exif-gps-cleaner").call(run_input={
    "imageUrls": ["https://example.com/a.jpg", "https://example.com/b.jpg"],
})
for img in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    if img.get("hasGps"):
        print("Leaked location:", img["gps"]["mapsUrl"])
    print("Clean copy:", img.get("cleanImageUrl"), "identical pixels:", img.get("pixelsIdentical"))

JavaScript

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>' });
const run = await client.actor('adorable_partial/exif-gps-cleaner').call({
    imageUrls: ['https://example.com/upload.jpg'],
    mode: 'clean',
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items[0].cleanImageUrl);

HTTP

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/adorable_partial~exif-gps-cleaner/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"imageUrls": ["https://example.com/photo.jpg"], "mode": "report"}'

No-code and agents: clean every new upload with Make, Zapier or n8n, trigger runs from webhooks, or let an AI agent check photos through the Apify MCP server.

FAQ

Does cleaning reduce quality? No. The image data is copied unchanged; only metadata blocks are removed. With Verify pixels on, every row confirms it with pixelsIdentical.

Why is the clean file smaller? Phones store a lot besides the picture: a preview thumbnail, XMP, sometimes an HDR gain map or a short motion-photo video. All of it is removed.

Will my photos appear rotated? No, the orientation tag is kept by default. Turn Keep orientation off only if you rotate images yourself.

Which formats? Cleaning: JPEG, PNG and WebP. Reading: also TIFF and most formats Pillow opens. HEIC/HEIF is not supported yet; convert to JPEG first.

Does it remove faces or license plates? No, that is visual content. Use the anonymizer below for that, and this Actor for the hidden data.

Is it legal to read other people's photo metadata? Reading metadata of images you are allowed to process is common practice (e.g. moderation, journalism, investigations). Respect privacy laws when you use the locations you find.

Related Actors

• Image & Video Anonymizer — blur faces and license plates in the same photos
• PII Masker — mask CPF, e-mails, phones and names in texts and datasets
• Face Compare — face verification and embeddings
• Video Optimizer — removes metadata from videos while compressing

Support

A file that was not fully cleaned? Open an issue in the Issues tab with a sample (without personal data).

Need a different tool? Request it

Missing a feature, an input or output format, or a whole different tool for your workflow? Open an issue in the Issues tab and describe what you need:

• what goes in (files, URLs, data) and what should come out,
• roughly how much you process (per day or month),
• one example, if you can share it.

Requests with a real use case get built, either as a new option in this Actor or as a new Actor in this collection, and you get notified in the issue when it's live. Every request is read.