Can you password protect a photo album on iPhone?

What Apple Photos can and cannot lock

Apple Photos locks two albums: Hidden and Recently Deleted. Apple’s support page says that “Face ID or Touch ID is required to view the Hidden and Recently Deleted albums by default”. The Personal Safety guide adds that “The Hidden album requires Face ID, Touch ID, or a passcode to unlock it.”

That passcode is the iPhone passcode. Photos settings offer one switch, Use Face ID, which turns the lock on or off for both albums together. There is no code for one album, and no code that differs from the iPhone’s. Our guide on how to password protect photos on iPhone covers every built-in option.

What an album code in York Vault does

An album code is a second lock inside your library. Your York Vault code opens the library. The album code opens one album in it.

On the Free plan, on iPhone, iPad and Android:

• Any album can have a code. The code can be a pattern, a PIN or a passcode, and it can differ from the type you use for the library.
• The album has its own key. The album code opens that key. So the main code alone cannot read the album, even with the library open.
• A locked album gives nothing away. It shows a blurred cover and no item count.
• Its items stay out of view. They do not show in search or in the grid of all items until you enter the album code.
• The lock does not depend on billing. If a plan ends, a locked album stays locked and opens with its code as before.

How to set an album code, step by step

1. Open your library with your York Vault code.
2. Open the album you want to lock.
3. Open the album’s settings and choose to set a code.
4. Pick Pattern, PIN or Passcode, and set the code.
5. Lock the album. Its cover blurs and the count disappears.
6. To open it, tap the album and enter the album code.

Album codes and the cover library

Each library checks album codes only inside itself. An album code in your main library is never compared with codes in the cover library. So settings in the cover library can never show, through an error message, that another code exists.

A way back into an album

Each album with a code has one of two modes, also on the Free plan:

• Linked (default). Your main code or your recovery key can reset the album code.
• Independent. Only the album code opens the album. It gets its own recovery key, shown once. Not even your main code can open it.

Face ID for locked albums

Each album has a Face ID switch, which covers a fingerprint or face on Android. With it off, the album code is needed even after Face ID or a fingerprint opened the library. Independent albums never allow Face ID.

Album code or cover code

York Vault has two ways to keep part of your library apart. They solve different problems.

An album code is for a person who already has your York Vault code, or who sees the app open. For example, a partner who uses the same library, or a moment when you hand over the phone to show a few photos. The rest of the library is open, but the locked album shows only a blurred cover.

A cover code is for a person who asks you to open the app. You type the cover code, and they see a separate library. Your main library, with all its albums, stays closed.

You can use both. An album code inside your main library adds a second lock on the items that matter most.

How other apps lock single albums

App	Single-album lock	Cost	Where we read it
Keepsafe	“Album Lock: Assign individual PIN codes to access particular albums”. Its app text adds “Cover images will be blurred as well.”	Premium	App Store listing and app text
Private Photo Vault	“Password Protected Photo Albums”. Its app text says “Require a password to open this album.”	Listed as free	App Store listing and app text
LockMyPix	Folder Lock. When Premium lapses, its app text says “Your Folder Lock is currently paused”.	Premium	App text
Vaultaire	No album lock. A different pattern opens a separate vault instead.	Free up to 3 vaults	App Store listing

We read each App Store package in September 2026 and checked the listings on 2026-10-02.

LockMyPix shows why an album lock must not depend on billing. A lock that pauses when a plan ends opens your most private album at the moment you are not watching for it.

Keepsafe resets all album passwords through an email access code. York Vault does not use email for any reset, because a person who gets into your email could use it.

Album codes and your camera roll

An album code protects what is inside York Vault. If the same photos are still in Apple Photos, they are not protected there. After you add photos, York Vault offers to remove the originals from Photos once it has checked its copy. See import and cleanup for the steps and for emptying Recently Deleted.

For more on Apple’s built-in album, read what the Hidden album is. For the main lock that sits above album codes, see lock options.