Private Safe on OPPO and realme: how to hide photos and files

OPPO and realme phones come with Private Safe, a locked space for photos, videos, audio and documents that opens with a privacy password. OnePlus phones have it too, since it replaced Lockbox. Here's how to set it up on ColorOS and realme UI, hide photos from the Photos app, get them back, and set up recovery so a forgotten password doesn't cost you everything.

What Private Safe does

Files you move into Private Safe leave the Photos and file manager apps and only open inside the safe, with your privacy password or, if you turn it on, your fingerprint or face. Screenshots aren't allowed inside it, according to realme's support pages. The same privacy password also protects App lock and Hide apps, so one password guards all three.

How to set up Private Safe

1. Open Settings and tap Security & privacy (just Privacy on older versions), then Private Safe. Searching Settings for "Private Safe" also works.
2. Set a privacy password. Make it different from your screen lock, because the people who know your screen lock are often the ones you're hiding photos from.
3. Add a recovery option when you're asked: a recovery email or a security question, depending on your version. On some phones you'll find it later under Settings → Password & biometrics → Privacy password.
4. To unlock with your fingerprint or face, open Private Safe, tap ⋮, then Settings, Privacy password and Other unlock methods.

How to hide photos with Private Safe

The quickest way is from the Photos app:

1. Open Photos and select the photos or videos.
2. Tap ⋮ at the bottom right.
3. Choose Set as private.

You can also open Private Safe, tap the add button and pick files of any type. On ColorOS 15 and later, Photos can make a whole album private the same way, so you don't have to select every photo.

How to see private photos, and make them public again

1. Open Private Safe from Settings, or from its home screen icon if you added one in its settings.
2. Enter your privacy password and open Images and videos.
3. To take photos out, long-press them, select the ones you want and tap Set as public.

Deleted something by mistake? Private Safe has its own Recently deleted folder, which keeps files for 30 days. Long-press them there and tap Restore.

If your photos aren't in Private Safe at all, they may be in a hidden album, Google Photos' Locked Folder or somewhere else. Our guide to finding hidden photos covers every place to look.

Hidden albums in ColorOS 16

ColorOS 16 adds a simpler option: hiding albums you made from the main Photos view. It's handy for tidying up, but it's not protection. There's no password, and the photos are still ordinary files that other apps can see. For anything private, use Private Safe.

If you forget the privacy password

Tap Forgot password on the privacy password screen and use the recovery email or security question you set up. That's the only way back in: without one, the only way to clear the privacy password is a factory reset, which erases Private Safe along with everything else on the phone. If you haven't added a recovery option yet, do it now.

Where Private Safe falls short

• Recovery. Everything depends on that recovery email or security question, and a security answer is something the people close to you might guess.
• Backups. Don't count on any backup including Private Safe unless you've restored one and seen it. If the phone is lost or reset, the safe's contents can go with it.
• The next phone. Private Safe only exists on OPPO, realme and OnePlus phones, so moving to another brand means taking everything out first.
• Copies elsewhere. Making a photo private doesn't remove copies Google Photos already backed up. Here's where those copies hide.

Hiding photos on OPPO and realme with Hidey

Hidey is a vault app that works the same on OPPO and realme phones as on any other Android phone. It encrypts each photo on your phone with AES-256-GCM, checks the encrypted copy, then deletes the original, so it's gone from Photos, your file manager and every other app. The vault opens with its own PIN or password, or your fingerprint.

The difference that matters most is the backup: Hidey backs up to a hidden folder in your own Google Drive, free and encrypted before upload, so your photos survive a lost or reset phone and move to your next one, whatever the brand. A forgotten PIN can be reset through Google after a 24-hour wait, with no factory reset. The catch is that whoever controls your Google account could reset it too, unless you turn on zero-knowledge mode (Pro). For every option side by side, see how to hide photos on Android.