Are you tired of your nosy friends, who don’t respect your privacy? Do you want to hide your personal photos on Android? If yes, then look no more.
Now, for many of us, WhatsApp is more than a messaging app. It’s personal. And we don’t want others to invade our privacy. Right? So what do we do, we lock it.
But even if you lock WhatsApp with AppLock, its photos/videos still appear inside the gallery. Off course, you can even lock your entire gallery with apps like Gallery Lock but that will raise more eyebrows.
So what do we do?
Well Instead of locking your gallery (or Photo app in Lollipop), it’s better to hide WhatsApp media folders instead. And the good news is, you don’t need any 3rd party app for that. All you have to do is rename a folder. Let’s see how.
Hide Whatsapp Picture in Android
1. First, you will need a file manager app to access WhatsApp directory in your SD card. If you don’t have one, download ES File Explorer.
Also See: 15 Super cool ES File Explorer Tips & Tricks
2. Once you have the file manager installed, open it. Navigate to ‘WhatsApp’s media’ folder. Usually it’s found under Home > sd card > WhatsApp > Media.
3. Under Media folder, you will see a sub-folder called ‘WhatsApp Images‘.
Rename this folder to ‘.Whatsapp Images‘ i.e. add a period in the name. You can do so, by long pressing the folder and select the rename option.
You can do this to any folder, whose content you want to hide from the gallery. Including the WhatsApp video folder.
4. Now if you go to your gallery, there will be no WhatsApp images or videos.
How do you bring it back?
To bring back the images in your gallery, remove the period ( . ) from the folder name. And that’s it.
However, if you don’t see the WhatsApp Image folder, then you need to enable ‘show hidden files’ option. To do that, open ES file explorer > swipe the screen from right to left > you will see an option menu > look for show hidden file and turn it on.
So how does it work?
Since Android is based on Linux kernel, if you add the period in front of any folder’s name, the OS thinks this is important system file and hides it.
You can use this trick for any folder, in any Linux-based operating system.
By default, WhatsApp is configured to automatically download images to your device. But if you don’t need these images later then you can disable the auto-downloading by going to WhatsApp > Menu Button > Settings > Chat settings > Media auto-download.
Hide WhatsApp Picture in iPhone
If you are iPhone user then hide WhatsApp images by going to your privacy setting > photos > turn WhatsApp off.
Video Tutorial: (this tip starts at 3.38 min)
No more prying eyes. Happy WhatsApping!
[Alternative]
I suggest you disable the gallery app and install QuickPic – a better alternative to the gallery app. Why? Well, because QuickPic has this hide images option inbuilt. Plus it’s faster and has better UI than then the gallery or photo app.
Better Replacement Apps for Android  (Table)
