Straight answers.

Compress them. Sweepr gathers the photos above a size you choose into a deck of their own, and one tap on Compress saves a lighter copy in the original's place: same resolution, same date, same location, same albums. How much comes back depends on the file. A heavy ProRAW frame, a PNG screenshot or a long 4K clip can give back a third of its size or more, while a photo already stored as efficient HEIC often has little left in it, and then Sweepr leaves it alone and says it is already small enough. For long videos there is trimming as well.

No. A compressed photo comes out at exactly the resolution it went in at. Compression changes how efficiently the pixels are stored, not how many of them there are. A 48 megapixel shot is still 48 megapixels afterwards, which is why it looks the same when you zoom in.

It goes into Sweepr's trash as soon as its lighter copy is ready, next to anything you swiped left, and until you leave the deck you can restore it from there. When you leave, iOS asks once whether to delete the originals, and confirming is what frees the space. After that they are in Recently Deleted in the Photos app, the same as anything else you delete on an iPhone.

Yes, and video is usually where the space actually is. One minute of 4K costs about 170 megabytes at 30 frames per second, and roughly 400 megabytes at 60. Keep a clip at its own size and just make it lighter, or step it down to 1080p or 720p. Choose the quality, Same as original, Balanced or Compact, and keep the frame rate or drop it to 30 or 24. If a clip is already efficient, Sweepr says so instead of spending minutes re-encoding it. The video stays in your library, on the same date, in the same albums.

Yes. Choose Trim from the ✦ button on a video card and drag the handles to the part you want to keep. The trimmed copy takes the original's place, and the original goes into the trash with everything else. You can compress the trimmed copy in the same step. Three trims are free, and Pro makes them unlimited.

Yes. Duplicates & Similar finds exact copies and photos that are nearly the same, a burst or the same picture saved twice, and puts each group side by side. You choose what stays and the rest goes into the trash, so nothing is removed without you seeing it. The comparison runs on the phone, and it is free.

No. Nothing in Sweepr deletes on its own. Failed Shots and Documents & Receipts use Apple's on-device image analysis to suggest candidates, and Duplicates & Similar groups photos that look alike, but every photo still waits for your swipe and which one stays is up to you.

Yes. The Failed Shots deck collects photos that are blurred, too dark or taken by accident in a pocket. It uses Apple's on-device image analysis together with plain checks of sharpness and brightness, and it is deliberately strict, so a good photo is rarely flagged. It only suggests: each photo still waits for your swipe.

Yes, with Pro. Contacts finds cards that share a phone number or a messenger handle, never just a name, and merges them into one card you check before saving. It also lists empty cards with no number or email. A deleted contact is kept in Sweepr for 30 days and can be restored. Contacts never leave the phone.

No. Sweepr has no server of its own, never reads the advertising identifier, and your photos, videos and contacts are never uploaded. Reviewing, deleting, compressing and trimming anything already on the device works with no network at all. A few things do use one, and none of them sends your library: buying or restoring Pro, through Apple and RevenueCat; a note to Meta that the app was installed and opened; Places, which asks Apple's map service for the city at a photo's coordinates and shows Apple's map; downloading a photo that lives only in iCloud; and the feedback form, if you write to the developer.

Sweepr gives back little from a library that is already efficient. Three cases: photos shot on an older iPhone at 8 or 12 megapixels are small to begin with; anything already stored as HEIC at a high quality setting has almost nothing left to remove, and Sweepr will say so rather than rewrite it; and a library that is mostly short clips and screenshots has its weight spread thinly, so the wins come a megabyte at a time. The rule of thumb is that compression pays off when a handful of files are very large, not when thousands are moderately large. Go through one month, look at Totals, and you will know within a few minutes whether it is worth continuing. Live Photos are a separate case: Sweepr never compresses them, because that would break the pairing between the still and its motion.

Almost always because Sweepr was given limited photo access instead of full access. With limited access iOS lets an app see the photos you picked but silently refuses every deletion, with no error message. Open Settings, Apps, Sweepr, Photos, and choose Full Access. Sweepr still sends nothing anywhere; full access is what iOS requires before any app is allowed to delete.

Sweepr is free to try. Free covers sorting photos and videos by swiping in every deck, with free swipes that come back over time, plus Duplicates & Similar, the trash, basic Totals, and three tries each at compressing in the deck and trimming a video. Pro removes the limits on swipes, compression and trims, adds Compress All, and opens the Compressor, Contacts clean-up, Files and the full Totals with the streak, activity map and charts. Pro comes weekly, monthly, yearly or once for life, and the App Store shows the price in your own currency before you buy.

Yes. Say "Start sweeping in Sweepr", "Find duplicates in Sweepr", "Show large videos in Sweepr" or "Compress photos in Sweepr", and the app opens on that deck. "How much has Sweepr freed" answers out loud. The same actions are in the Shortcuts app, and on iOS 18 and later a Start Sweeping button can go in Control Center.

iPhone and iPad with iOS 17 or later. The map in Places needs iOS 26, earlier versions show places as a list, and the Control Center button needs iOS 18. On iPad Sweepr has a layout of its own and turns to landscape, and on iPhone Duo it opens like a book when half folded. The app speaks more than 30 languages, Arabic and Hebrew included, and follows your system language.

At the maximum quality setting, which is the default, the difference is not visible on screen and does not affect a normal print. If you have files you want untouched, raise the size threshold so they are never offered for compression, or tap Keep on them in the compression deck, which leaves the file exactly as it is.

Open Screenshots on the home screen, pick a year or a month, and swipe. Screenshots are mostly clutter, so a left swipe on each takes a second, and the trash at the top of the deck lets you take any of them back before iOS asks once to delete them all.

Yes, with Pro. Pick any folder the Files app can open: On My iPhone, Downloads, iCloud Drive, a hard drive or USB stick, or a camera's memory card through an adapter, on iPhone and iPad. Sweepr lists its files largest first, with filters for photos, videos, documents, audio and archives, and you swipe each one. Swiping a picture or a clip down saves it to Photos. Deleted files go to Recently Deleted in the Files app; a drive or card that has none asks you to confirm before anything is removed for good.