How to Hide Messages on iPhone (7 Simple Ways)

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While you can’t natively hide messages on your iPhone on older versions of iOS, you can now do exactly that. This guide will show you exactly how to hide messages on iPhone devices on the home screen and in the messaging app. We’ll also discuss other ways you can buff your privacy with third-party apps and jailbreak your phone. Read on to learn more.

Why Hide Messages on iPhone?

Texting privacy has significantly improved, especially on more recent versions of iOS, such as iOS 11 and higher. You are undoubtedly familiar with how it feels to know that your personal information, including private photos, conversations, and even applications, is only a few taps or swipes away from being uncovered. But with the right lock settings, there is no need to hide private messages to protect privacy.

Text previews are displayed, but the real message will only appear once users unlock the device using Touch ID or Face ID. Instead of showing users the text’s content, your preview appears on the iPhone as Text Message and iMessage.

Apple made it convenient to reply to received messages by displaying a pop-up allowing you to quickly reply to the message by swiping left. However, not everyone wants them to be displayed on the lock screen. Thankfully, you can also disable the lock screen preview, meaning that your sensitive text messages won’t be displayed on the lock screen for prying eyes to see.

Related Reading: How to Mark Text as Unread on an iPhone

How to Hide Texts on iPhone

There are multiple ways in which you can hide texts on your iPhone. Let’s take a look at some of them.

How to Hide iMessage Conversations in Specific Chains

Here is how you can hide texts on an iPhone in specific chains:

  1. Open your Messages application.
  2. Select the chats you do not wish to see as you scroll down.
  3. Tap on the icon of the contact’s display picture.
  4. On the pop-up menu, toggle the Hide Alerts option.
Hide alerts to hide messages on an iPhone

Whenever a new message from this chain arrives, an alert will no longer appear on your screen, but you will still be able to receive their messages.

How to Hide Notifications on iPhone

Here is how to not show messages on iPhone:

  1. Open your Settings app.
  2. Click on the Notifications option. A list of all the applications on your device that sends notifications will open.
How to hide messages on iPhone with notifications
  1. To stop all the notifications, click on Show Previews at the top of your screen. Here, click on the Never option.
How to prevent previews from showing on an iPhone
  1. You can click on the When Unlocked option to only limit the messages displayed. This way, you will still get the notifications, but you will not see the previews.
  2. To stop notifications from specific applications, click on the specific application and toggle Allow Notifications off.
  3. The application’s display will be stopped popping up.

If you disable all notifications, you’ll need to open every application individually to read any texts delivered to you, or you’ll need to open only those apps with limited display settings.

Related: How To Use the Do Not Disturb iPhone

How to Hide Conversations on iPhone for a Specific Contact

Here is how to hide iPhone messages for a specific contact:

  1. Open your iPhone application and choose the Contacts option towards the bottom part of the screen. Tap on the contact whose texts you would like to hide.
  2. Click on the Edit option on the screen’s top right.
  3. Scroll down and click on the Delete Contact option.
  4. Click the Delete Contact option again to open a new pop-up menu to confirm your action.
  5. Now, open your Settings app. Scroll downwards and click on the Messages option.
  6. Turn on the toggle next to the Filter Unknown Senders option when you scroll down under the heading of Message Filtering.

A list stored from the bulk of your chats will now contain the messages received from the person you removed or anyone not in your contacts. In the Messages app, click on Filters on the top-left side, then press Unknown senders to see it.

How to Hide iMessages by Auto-Locking Your iPhone

Keeping your iPhone locked whenever it’s not being used will prevent others from randomly accessing and reading your messages. An iPhone will lock its screen after thirty seconds by default. The user may prolong the time limit if they want.

Here are the steps on how you can prolong your screen display time:

  1. Open your Settings app.
  2. Click on the Display & Brightness option.
  3. Choose the Auto-Lock option.
  4. Choose the time for auto-locking your display from thirty seconds to 5 minutes.
    Auto lock settings

In addition, you can remotely lock the iPhone by hitting the Sleep/Wake button; this will switch off the phone and make it necessary to enter the code or biometric scan to use the device. If they would rather, individuals who own an iPhone X or later can set Face ID in place of a code or biometric scan.

How to Hide Text Messages iPhone on the Lockscreen Preview

Here is how to hide alerts on iPhone on the lock screen:

  1. Open Settings on your iPhone and scroll down to Notifications. There, click on Messages.
  2. Scroll to find the Include option.
  3. Here you will see the Show Preview option. Make sure you select Never.
    Choose when to show previews
  4. Now, turn off your screen and have someone send you a message. Make sure that the message cant be previewed on the lock screen.

Related Reading: Learn to Schedule a Text Message on an iPhone in 2 Minutes

How to Hide Text Messages on iPhone Using Cydia

Older Apple products with iOS prior to 11 don’t offer a built-in way to hide text messages in the Messages application. However, a helpful Cydia hack called HiddenConvos enables you to quickly swipe and click to hide a chat in the Messages application.

Here is how to hide messages on iPhone without deleting them on your iPhone using Cydia:

  1. Simply open Cydia on your jailbroken iPhone to download the free HiddenConvos add-on.
  2. Open Messages after installing the tweak, and swipe left across any chat you like. The Delete option will be replaced with a new Hide option.
  3. The chat will disappear if you tap it without removing it. To make it reappear, select Edit and then click on Unhide All.

Related Reading: How to Get iMessage on Windows PC

How to Hide iMessages on iPhone Using Apps

Not everyone wants to go through the hassle of jailbreaking their iPhones. The good news is that even without complicated Cydia tweaks like HiddenConvos, you can increase your privacy with common App Store apps.

Although it can allow you to add many useful features, it may also open up your iPhone to potential security risks. Let’s take a look at some of them.

CoverMe

This app is a full privacy option that provides military-grade encryption algorithms for private messaging and calling, private file transfer, and self-destructing texts, and a private Vault that functions as an unbreakable safe for all your personal files, data, and documents.

CoverMe also offers helpful user access settings that might assist you in safeguarding your phone from burglars and criminals. Although the application is free to download, many features must be enabled through in-app purchases, and some need credits, which you can also buy through in-app purchases.

iDiscrete

One of the privacy applications with the greatest features in the App Store is iDiscrete. IDiscrete is a safe storage container where you can keep any data you want to keep hidden. Videos, pictures, and texts can all be part of this. The unique Touch Sequence Protection security feature distinguishes iDiscrete from other comparable applications.

A fake loading page shows when someone who shouldn’t is trying to open the application. The program is looking for a passcode, which may be inserted by touching the proper spots, but only the phone owner knows this.

Vault

Vault is also one of the best options if you seek a small yet feature-rich application for secure and private messaging. The app includes all the features required to hide contacts, calls, and texts on your iPhone.

Vault includes a passcode-protected function that prevents unauthorized access to the application’s texts. Vault enables premium subscribers to restrict particular apps on their iPhones for a much more secure experience, even though it is completely free.

Wickr Me

Wickr Me is a platform for group and business collaboration that is end-to-end encrypted. You can create a group of up to 10 team members for quick and highly secured team communication, deliver self-destructing texts, delete metadata from multimedia, and safely delete all conversations, videos, and photographs from any device.

Related Reading: How to Turn Off Do Not Disturb on iPhone

Frequently Asked Questions

Can You Hide Messages on iPhone?

To hide message notifications, open your iPhone’s settings and then head over to Messages. There, click on Notifications and then tap the Show Previews option. Here, click on Never.

How to Hide Text Messages From One Person on iPhone?

Open the phone app and choose Contacts towards the bottom. Select the contact whose texts you want to hide and click on Edit. Scroll down and click the Delete Contact option. Click Delete Contact again to open a new pop-up to confirm. Now, open your Settings app. Scroll downwards and click on the Messages option. Turn on the toggle next to the Filter Unknown Senders option when you scroll down under Message Filtering.

Wrapping Up

Now you know how to hide messages on iPhone devices no matter which version of iOS you’re running. We’d recommend trying out one of the options that don’t require jailbreaking or downloading third-party software first. But if that doesn’t do exactly what you need, try out some of the other options.

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