How to hide photos on a Xiaomi, Redmi or POCO phone

Hiding an album takes three taps. Locking one is a different job.

Short answer

In Gallery, long-press the album and choose Hide. To see hidden albums again, go to Gallery, the three-dot menu, Settings, then View hidden albums. Hidden albums aren't locked, so for anything private use a vault with its own lock.

These steps are from Xiaomi's own support pages for recent phones on HyperOS. Older MIUI versions are similar, though menu names can differ slightly.

Hide an album

  1. Open Gallery and go to Albums.
  2. Long-press the album you want to hide.
  3. Tap Hide, then OK.

See hidden albums again

  1. Open Gallery.
  2. Tap the three-dot menu, then Settings.
  3. Tap View hidden albums, then Unhide on any album you want back.

The catch

A hidden album is only hidden. There's no password on it, and the steps to bring it back are the same on every Xiaomi phone. Anyone who borrows your phone and knows the trick can see everything in a few seconds. It also doesn't stop the photos from syncing to any cloud backup you have turned on.

For anything private

Use a vault with its own lock. Dobr works on Xiaomi, Redmi and POCO phones running Android 8 or later. Each photo is encrypted before it's saved, the vault opens with a pattern that unlocks nothing else, and the app has no internet permission. Once your photos are in, Dobr offers to delete the originals from your gallery.

Our general guide to hiding photos on Android compares every option side by side.

Last checked 2026-11-01. Phone menus change between Android versions and brands, so labels on your phone may differ slightly.

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