You hand your phone to a friend to show them a photo, and for a second you wonder what else they can see on your home screen. A banking app, a dating app, a work chat — none of them are secret, but none of them are anyone else's business either. Deleting the app is overkill: you still use it, you just do not want it on display.
Hide, lock, or delete: pick the right one
These three words sound alike, but they do very different things, and picking the wrong one is the most common mistake in this whole guide.
Hiding removes the icon from view. On iPhone it also locks the app; on Samsung it only removes the icon. Locking keeps the icon where it is but demands Face ID, a fingerprint, or a passcode every time the app opens. Deleting removes the app and its on-device data entirely — the nuclear option, and the only one that frees storage space.
| Method | What it does | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Hide (iPhone, iOS 18+) | Icon leaves the Home Screen, search, and App Library; app sits in a locked Hidden folder | Keeping a downloaded app out of sight and behind Face ID |
| Remove from Home Screen (iPhone) | Icon leaves the Home Screen but the app stays in App Library and search | Tidying up, or hiding a built-in app that cannot be truly hidden |
| Hide apps (Samsung) | Icon leaves the Home and Apps screens; app stays installed | Tidying a Galaxy phone without locking anything |
| Private Space (Pixel, Android 15+) | Apps live in a separate, lockable space at the bottom of the app drawer | The strongest built-in hiding on stock Android |
| Disable (Android) | Icon disappears and the app stops running | Pre-installed apps you never use |
On iPhone: hide an app behind Face ID (iOS 18 and later)
This is the real hiding option, and it only exists on iOS 18 and later. It works for apps you downloaded from the App Store. Apps that came with your iPhone cannot be hidden this way — for those, use the remove-from-Home-Screen route in the next section.
- Find the app on your Home Screen.
- Touch and hold its icon until the quick actions menu opens.
- Tap Require Face ID (or Require Touch ID, or Require Passcode, depending on your iPhone).
- Tap Hide and Require Face ID.
- Authenticate with Face ID, Touch ID, or your passcode, then tap Hide App to confirm.
The app disappears from your Home Screen, from search results, and from the visible parts of App Library. It now lives in a Hidden folder at the bottom of App Library, which itself needs authentication to open. Its information also stops appearing in places like notification previews, Siri suggestions, and call history.
A few honest limits, straight from Apple's own guidance: hiding an app on your iPhone hides it only on that iPhone — the hidden state does not sync to your iPad through iCloud. The app's name can still show up in some places, such as Screen Time, battery usage by app, and your App Store purchase history. And an app you set as your default web browser, or as an app marketplace where that option exists, cannot be hidden.
On iPhone: clear an app off the Home Screen without hiding it
If your iPhone runs an older iOS version, or the app is a built-in one that cannot be hidden, this is the next best thing. It takes the icon off your Home Screen without touching the app or its data.
- Touch and hold the app icon on your Home Screen.
- Tap Remove App.
- Tap Remove from Home Screen — not Delete App, which uninstalls it.
The app stays installed and reachable in App Library, which you reach by swiping left past your last Home Screen page. You can also find it by pulling down and searching for it by name, so treat this as tidying rather than privacy: anyone who searches will find it.
You can go one step further and hide a whole Home Screen page at once. Touch and hold an empty area of the Home Screen, tap the dots near the bottom of the screen, tap the circle under the page you want to hide, then tap Done. Every app on that page disappears from the Home Screen while staying in App Library, and repeating the steps brings the page back.
On Samsung: hide apps on the Home and Apps screens
Samsung's built-in hide option removes icons from both the Home screen and the Apps screen without uninstalling anything. Your app data, settings, and account stay exactly as they were.
- Open Settings.
- Tap Home screen.
- Tap Hide apps on Home and Apps screens.
- Select every app you want to hide.
- Tap Done.
The icons disappear immediately. To bring an app back, return to the same menu and deselect it from the hidden list. If you cannot find the option, use the search box at the top of Settings and search for "Hide apps" — Samsung moves menu names between One UI versions, and the search finds the current location on your phone.
Be clear-eyed about what this does: it hides icons, nothing more. A hidden app can still appear in Settings, in the Play Store's installed list, and in share sheets, and its notifications can still arrive. For an app you want genuinely locked away, Samsung's Secure Folder is the stronger tool. Open the Secure Folder app, set it up with your Samsung account and a lock of your choice, then tap the plus icon inside it to add apps. Apps inside Secure Folder live separately from the rest of your phone and need your Secure Folder lock to open.
On Pixel and stock Android: use Private Space (Android 15 and later)
Pixel phones had no built-in way to hide apps for years. Android 15 fixed that with Private Space: a separate, lockable section at the bottom of the app drawer. When Private Space is locked, its apps vanish from the app list, recent apps, notifications, and Settings.
- Open Settings, then tap Security & privacy.
- Tap Private Space and authenticate with your screen lock.
- Tap Set up and follow the prompts. You can give Private Space its own lock — a different PIN, pattern, or fingerprint from your main lock — and you can sign in with a separate Google account so its Play Store history stays apart from your main account.
- Once set up, scroll to the bottom of your app drawer to find the Private Space section, unlock it, and tap the plus icon to install apps inside it.
There is one catch to plan around: you cannot move an existing app into Private Space with its data. Apps inside Private Space are installed fresh there, so you will sign in again, and the copy on your main profile stays put until you remove it yourself. Also note that while Private Space is locked, its apps cannot run in the background, so their notifications go quiet until you unlock it again.
If your phone has no hide option
Not every Android phone has a hide feature, and older Android versions have no Private Space. Two fallbacks cover almost everything.
First, disable the app. Go to Settings, then Apps, choose the app, and tap Disable. The icon disappears from the home screen and app drawer, and the app stops running. This is the standard route for pre-installed apps you never use, and you reverse it from the same screen by tapping Enable. Note that not every app offers Disable — system apps your phone needs will not show the option.
Second, check your launcher. Many phone makers and third-party launchers include their own hide-apps setting, usually under the launcher's home screen settings or a long-press on an empty area of the home screen. If your phone has one, it behaves like Samsung's version: icons only, no lock.
How to find a hidden app again
Hidden apps have a habit of being forgotten, then panicking their owners. Before assuming an app is gone, check the right place for your phone.
On iPhone, swipe left past all Home Screen pages to App Library and open the Hidden folder at the bottom, authenticating first. You can also see everything you have hidden in one list under Settings, then Apps, then Hidden Apps, after authenticating. On Samsung, return to Settings, then Home screen, then Hide apps on Home and Apps screens, where hidden apps are listed. On Pixel, scroll to the bottom of the app drawer for Private Space and unlock it — or search the drawer for "Private space" if you turned on hiding while locked.
If the app is in none of those places, it may simply have been removed from the Home Screen: check App Library on iPhone, or the full app drawer on Android. And if it is genuinely nowhere, it was probably deleted rather than hidden — in that case, reinstalling it from the App Store or Play Store brings it back, though its on-device data may be gone.
FAQ
Does hiding an app delete it or its data?
No. On every method in this guide, hiding only removes the icon or moves the app behind a lock. The app stays installed and its data stays on the phone. The only action that deletes data is choosing Delete App (iPhone) or Uninstall (Android).
Can I hide apps that came with my phone?
On iPhone, no — built-in apps cannot be hidden with Hide and Require Face ID, only removed from the Home Screen. On Samsung, pre-installed apps can be hidden from the Home and Apps screens, and many can also be disabled. On Pixel, you can install a fresh copy of most apps inside Private Space, but system apps that cannot be installed there stay visible.
On iPhone, a hidden app's information stops appearing in notification previews and other places, and its alerts are suppressed while it is hidden. On Samsung, hiding only removes the icon, so notifications can still arrive — if that bothers you, mute the app's notifications or move it to Secure Folder instead. On Pixel, Private Space apps go silent while the space is locked and resume when you unlock it.
Yes, on iPhone — the Hidden folder opens with the same Face ID or passcode that unlocks the phone. The same is true of Pixel Private Space if you use your device lock for it. For a lock a passcode-holder cannot open, give Private Space its own separate lock, or use Samsung Secure Folder with its own lock.
Does hiding an app free up storage space?
No. A hidden app still occupies the same storage. Only deleting or offloading an app frees space.
I hid an app and now I cannot find it at all. Is it gone?
Almost certainly not. On iPhone, check App Library's Hidden folder and Settings, then Apps, then Hidden Apps. On Samsung, check the Hide apps menu. On Pixel, check the bottom of the app drawer for Private Space. If it is in none of those places, search the phone for the app by name before concluding it was deleted.
Sources and further reading
Apple's own steps for locking and hiding apps, including which apps cannot be hidden, are in Apple Support's guide to locking or hiding an app on iPhone, and the remove-from-Home-Screen and hidden-page steps are in Apple Support's guide to organising the Home Screen and App Library. For Samsung, the hide-apps route is in Samsung's guide to deleting pre-installed apps on Galaxy devices, and for Pixel, the full Private Space setup is in Google's Pixel help page on hiding sensitive apps with private space.