If you have issue with photos captured on iPhone or iPad doesn’t have location data. Following methods can get you location working for photos and videos.
- Make sure your location access to camera app in “Settings > Privacy > Location services > Camera” is set to “While using the App”. Once you set location access, photos you capture from now using Apple’s native camera app would have location geotagged within photos metadata
- iPhone gets location using GPS Satellites, If its unavailable, iPhone might use cell tower location to triangulate your location. So when you capture photo from within a Tunnel or places with low sky visibility, problem might be GPS satellite locations or cell tower signal data aren’t available. Solution would be move to different location where this location data can be obtained by iPhone.
- If you have recently updated iOS. The new version of iOS might have introduced a bug which prevents photos from getting geotag locations. So try restarting iPhone and see if that fixes the problem.
These would fix location of photos you are going to capture. Not the photos you already shot in past with location not available.
To fix location of existing photos,on iOS 15+ use “Photos app” , select desired photo, tap on Adjust to change location and select location manually.
Or use any exif app allows editing location, like our “EXIF Viewer by Fluntro” app.
Appstore link of EXIF Viewer by Fluntro – https://apps.apple.com/us/app/exif-viewer-by-fluntro/id944118456

Highly Recommend to try out Lite (Free Trial version) first
EXIF Viewer by Fluntro Lite to view Photos resolution in EXIF Metadata before downloading Paid Full version.
Appstore link of Free Lite version :- https://apps.apple.com/us/app/exif-viewer-lite-by-fluntro/id979066584
Appstore link of Paid Full version :- https://apps.apple.com/us/app/exif-viewer-by-fluntro/id944118456
My iPhone SE running iOS 15.6 geotags photos only when not in Airplane mode. Is that the way it’s supposed to work?
As per our knowledge, On iPhone Airplane Mode only disables radio signals, like cellular, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth etc.
However it doesn’t Block GPS Signal getting received on iPhone.
Probably issue is, when you don’t have enough sky visibility (GPS Satellite in visible area), then you might not get GPS Coordinates and photos might not get geotagged.
However without Airplane mode, iPhone uses Wifi signals, cellular signals to triangulate location coordinates of your iPhone.
We have tested functionality of GPS on Airplane flying at 35,000 feet height with Airplane Mode ON. GPS was able to capture GPS coordinates and GPS speed.
Screenshot shared in following link https://exifviewerapp.com/how-to-check-altitude-and-speed-at-which-photo-is-captured/