How do you get your photos out of NQ Vault and move to York Vault?

NQ Vault, listed on the App Store as “Vault - Hide photos & videos”, has no export guide on its current website. This guide gives the path in the app text of version 4.6.54, and the steps around it. We checked each Apple and Google step against their help pages on 2026-10-06. If you are still deciding whether to leave, read the NQ Vault alternative page first.

What NQ Vault offers to get files out

Path	What it does	Limits
Export to your phone albums	Saves the selected items to Photos	Unprotected copies. Needs Photos access. Stops if you leave the app
Cloud Backup, then Restore	Downloads backed-up items to the phone	Premium and an NQ account. Space drops to 1 GB when Premium expires
WiFi Import	Sends files from a computer browser into Vault	The app labels it as import. We could not confirm that it downloads files out
Email share	Sends one item at a time	Not for a library. Long videos show “You can Export to your albums”

So Export to your albums is the real route out. Cloud Backup only brings items back to the phone first.

Before you start

1. Update Vault. The current iPhone version is 4.6.54, from August 2026.
2. Count your items. Write down the photo and video count of every album. Include the default albums “My Photos” and “My Videos”.
3. List every passcode. Vault can hold a Fake Vault with its own passcode. Its items do not show in the main vault.
4. Check free space. Vault shows “Not enough storage to export” when the phone is full. Exported copies take the same space as the originals.
5. Keep the old phone. Do not delete Vault, and do not erase the phone, until the end of this guide.

If you forgot your passcode, stop here and read forgot your photo vault password. NQ Vault resets a passcode only through a security email set up earlier.

Step by step: move from NQ Vault to York Vault

1. Count your items. Update Vault, open it, and write down the photo and video count of every album.
2. Restore from Cloud Backup if needed. If some items are only in NQ Cloud Backup, sign in to your NQ account. Tap Restore to download them to the phone.
3. Export in small batches. Select 10 to 20 items in an album and tap Export. Confirm Export to your phone albums?. Keep the app open until Export complete shows.
4. Export the Fake Vault too. If you set a Fake Vault, open Vault with that passcode. Export its items the same way.
5. Check the counts. In Photos, check that every item arrived once. Compare the totals with your notes.
6. Add the items to York Vault. In York Vault, tap Add and pick the exported items in the photo picker. Wait until York Vault checks each copy.
7. Remove the copies from Photos. Tap Remove from Photos and confirm. Then delete the items from Recently Deleted in Photos.
8. Cancel, then delete NQ Vault. Cancel Vault Premium in the store that bills you. Delete the Vault app only after every count matches.

Why small batches

During an export, Vault shows: “Please don’t leave this app or lock your phone. This may take a few minutes”. Some reviewers lost an export part way through. One wrote: “I selected multiple pictures and it crashed after sending the second picture” (1★, October 2024). A small batch costs little if it fails. Keep the screen on and stay in the app.

If Vault cannot export

• No permission. Vault then says it “doesn’t have permission to access” your photos. Allow Vault to access Photos, then try again.
• A file type Photos does not take. Vault then says it “Can not export files because the system does not support this type of files.” Note which items fail. Without a working export, those items cannot leave the app.
• Cloud sign-in errors. Many reviewers report a “network error” on restore. Keep the old phone and the app until you can sign in. The App Store page lists vault@nq.com for support.

NQ Vault on Android

NQ Vault on Google Play is “Vault - Hide Pics, App Lock”, updated September 18, 2026. Its listing says Cloud Backup moves data to a new phone. It describes no export to the gallery. Its Q&A also warns that cleaning apps can delete the Vault data folder (mnt/sdcard/SystemAndroid). Do not run a cleaner during the move.

We did not read the text of the Android app, so we cannot confirm its button names. Use the export in the app if it shows one, and count each album as above. York Vault is on Google Play too, and the add and count steps are the same there.

Clean up: Photos and Recently Deleted

Exported items are no longer protected. After York Vault has checked its copies, remove them from Photos. The remove originals help page shows the York Vault side of this step.

Photos keeps deleted items for 30 days. To clear them now, follow these Apple steps for iOS 18 and later:

1. Open the Photos app and tap Collections.
2. Tap Recently Deleted (below Utilities), tap View Album, then unlock your iPhone.
3. Tap Select, then choose the items.
4. Tap the More button, then tap Delete.

Our Recently Deleted guide covers the album in detail. With iCloud Photos on, the delete applies to all your devices.

Cancel Premium, then delete the app

Cancel before you delete. A subscription belongs to your store account, not to the app.

• iPhone: open Settings, tap your name, tap Subscriptions, tap Vault, then tap Cancel Subscription. The Vault terms say you cannot cancel the current period. The plan stops at the next renewal.
• Android: go to your subscriptions in Google Play, select Vault, then tap Cancel subscription. Google says: “When you uninstall the app, your subscription won’t cancel.”

Older one-time purchases, such as Break-in Alerts or SecureCam, do not renew and need no cancel. The cancel a subscription help page shows the same store screens for York Vault.

To delete Vault on iPhone, touch and hold the app, tap Remove App, tap Delete App, then tap Delete. Apple says this “removes it and its data from your iPhone.”

On Android, open the Play Store and tap the profile icon. Tap Manage apps & devices, then Manage. Select Vault and tap Uninstall.

Your NQ account and its cloud copy stay after you delete the app. In the Vault settings, Delete Account opens an email that asks NQ to delete the account.

What York Vault does for this move

York Vault adds items from the photo picker with no Photos permission, and keeps the order you picked. It reads back each encrypted copy and checks it before it offers Remove from Photos. Then a short guide opens Photos so you can empty Recently Deleted. See import and cleanup.

Each item backs up, encrypted, to your own iCloud, or to your own Google Drive on Android. There is no account to sign in to. Viewing, export and restore of your own items stay free on every plan, and York Vault has no ads. Free adds new items up to a set limit, and Plus has no item limit. See pricing. Download York Vault on the App Store or Google Play.