Guides / Take photos straight into a vault

Take photos straight into a vault

Updated 3 November 2026 · By the FirstHour team

Short answerA picture taken in the Camera app lands in Photos, where it's easy to find and may upload to iCloud. A vault app with its own camera can save a picture inside itself instead, so it never reaches your camera roll. It's useful for things like a document or a receipt you want to keep private from the start.

Why bother

The usual way is to take a picture, then move it into a vault. That leaves a gap: for a while, the picture sits in Photos. Apple says that with iCloud Photos on, your photos and videos sync to iCloud, and a deleted photo is kept in Recently Deleted for 30 days. Even after you move a picture, a copy can linger there for a month.

Taking it straight into the vault avoids that. There's nothing to clean up afterward.

What to check in any vault app

Is the camera built in, rather than opening your normal Camera?
Does it really skip Photos? Take one, then look in Photos.
Is it encrypted at once, not only after you leave the app?
Can you get it out later, and is there a backup option?

How it works in FirstHour

Open the Vault and tap +, then Take a photo or video.
iPhone asks to allow the camera, and the microphone for a video. FirstHour uses the camera only for this, and the microphone only to record sound with a video.
Take the picture or video, then keep it or retake it. You get iPhone's own camera screen, with front or back, flash and focus.
FirstHour seals it, and says "Locked in the vault. It was never in Photos."

The camera menu only shows if your iPhone has a camera it can use. The picture is saved as an ordinary JPEG, and a video as a video file, and it's sorted by when you added it.

What this can't do

It's one copy. A picture taken this way isn't in Photos or iCloud Photos, so if the Vault is lost, it's gone. Without a backup file you save yourself, losing the iPhone loses it too. Back it up.
It's a basic camera. We haven't listed what modes it offers, so don't assume everything in the Camera app is there.
The Vault locks when you leave FirstHour. Finish the shot before you switch apps.
A video exists unlocked for a moment. While FirstHour seals it, a temporary copy sits in the app's own protected storage and is removed afterward.
It doesn't stop someone seeing you take it, or a copy someone else already has.

Questions

Will the picture show up in Photos later?

No. FirstHour doesn't add it to Photos. You can save it there yourself from the Vault, and then it's an ordinary picture again.

What if I took it in the Camera app by mistake?

You can move it into the Vault from Photos. iPhone asks before removing the original, which then sits in Recently Deleted for 30 days.

Sources

Delete photos on your iPhone or iPad, Apple Support
What does iCloud back up?, Apple Support