Manage Significant Locations on the iPad and iPhone

Dan Wassink 0:01
In this video, we’re going to look at how we can take a look at how many significant locations our iPhone has tracked. And how we can clear these. Every time you go somewhere with your iPad or iPhone, that device may track that as a significant location, you used to be able to view where those significant locations are. Now all you can do is see how many there are, and you can clear them. Let’s see what I mean. Let’s go to my iPad, and iPhone.

So I’m looking at my iPad and iPhone, let’s first look at the iPad. And if you want to see how many significant locations your iPad has tracked, what we need to do is go over to our settings app. When we go over to our settings app, what we do is we go over to privacy. Under Privacy, there’s going to be a few steps here. Under Privacy, you’re going to see location services, tap on that. And now what I do is I go down to the bottom and then you’re going to see system services. When I select System Services, what I’m able to do is see significant locations.

I tap on this. And now I can see how many significant locations my iPad has been to. So again, let’s review that there are quite a few steps there. So I’m in my privacy settings here, then what I do is I go to location services. And then we go to system services from system services, we need to go down towards the bottom two significant locations. And then under significant locations, you’re going to see how many places your iPad has been to. Now in past versions of iOS, you actually used to be able to see a map of where these different locations are. Since iPad os 15 was introduced, all we can do is just get a summary here.

And then we can see our recent records, we can’t see all of the different records. If you want to clear this, all you have to do is just go down to clear history. And you can clear that history. If you no longer want the iPad to track your significant locations, what you can do is turn this off. But when you turn this off, some of the apps that use your location may not be able to give you the correct information such as the weather app as an example. It’s not really necessary to turn this off because it is end to end encrypted. Apple does keep all of that information encrypted.

So your apps are not going to be able to look at this information and track where you’ve been, they may be able to do it on their own, but they will not be able to access the significant locations from your iPad, all of your significant locations because it is end to end encrypted. Let’s see what this looks like on the iPhone, basically, you can imagine it’s going to be the same thing. So I go over to my iPhone. And then what we do is we go over to our settings app. Under Settings, what we need to do is go to privacy. Under Privacy, we go to location services.

When we go to location services, what we do is scroll up until we find system services, this is going to be at the bottom under system services. At the very bottom we have significant locations. So again, there’s quite a few taps there. From here, what you’re able to do is get a summary, you can see what your recent locations are your recent records, and then you can also clear the history. And again, this is end to end encrypted. So your apps, other apps are not going to be able to read this information. So it’s pretty secure. But if you do want to turn it off, you can turn it off. But again, your apps may not be able to work properly because they do not know what your location is. What I would recommend is just leaving this on it is end to end encrypted apple and crypsis. No other apps are going to be able to read that information, this list of significant locations that you’ve been to. But if you did want to clear it, what you can do is clear it and you can turn it off. So that’s how you can see how many significant locations have been tracked on your iPad and iPhone.