How to turn off or restrict Airdrop on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac

Learn how to turn off or restrict the built-in AirDrop feature on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac to control who can wirelessly beam you files for better privacy and security.

Note the distinction between turning off and restricting AirDrop. Turning AirDrop off essentially puts the feature on pause while restricting blocks it altogether. This is particularly handy if you want to stop a child from using AirDrop.

Why turn off AirDrop

Privacy: Turning off AirDrop entirely or restricting its visibility to your contacts makes you undiscoverable on AirDrop. This helps protect you from unsolicited AirDrop requests for receiving  nudes in public spaces like cinemas or restaurants.

Less confusion among multiple devices: With multiple devices of the same kind like iPads, iPhones, or Macs, it may be confusing which device is sending files. To help with that, turn off AirDrop on any devices not receiving files or give unique names to all your Apple devices to easily distinguish them on the AirDrop pane.

How to turn off AirDrop

You have a few easy ways to turn AirDrop off.

On iPhone or iPad

1. Open the Settings app and tap General.
2. Select AirDrop.
3. Tap Receiving Off to disable AirDrop on your iPhone or iPad.

Another method:

1. Open the Control Center on your iPhone, then touch and hold the Connectivity control with various network icons to reveal more options.
2. Tap AirDrop and choose Receiving Off.

On Mac

1. Open System Settings and select General in the sidebar.
2. Pick AirDrop & Handoff on the right side.
3. Click the menu next to AirDrop and choose No One to turn off AirDrop on this device.

Another method:

1. Open the Finder and select AirDrop in the sidebar.
2. Click Allow me to be discovered by and choose No One to disable AirDrop on this Mac.

Re-enable AirDrop when needed

You don’t need to change these visibly settings to send files via AirDrop. But if you’d like to receive files via AirDrop, be sure to follow the above steps but choose Contacts Only, Everyone for 10 Minutes, or Everyone instead.

Related: Is AirDrop not working? Here’s how to fix it

Turn off Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, or both to disable AirDrop

AirDrop uses a combination of Bluetooth for discovery and Wi-Fi for data transfer. So, If you turn off Bluetooth or Wi-Fi or both in Settings > Wi-Fi and Settings > Bluetooth, AirDrop will stop working.

Note: Don’t use the Control Center. Toggling the Wi-Fi or Bluetooth icons in the Control Center’s Connectivity group only disconnects ylur device from the current network and stops it from scanning or joining new networks and connections. Otherwise, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi remain active for essential built-in features like AirDrop, Personal Hotspot, showing battery levels of connected devices, and more.

Completely restrict or block AirDrop

You can also restrict AirDrop on your device instead of turning it off to stop anyone with access to your device from re-enabling the feature without your Screen Time passcode. When you restrict AirDrop, the device won’t be able to send or receive files via AirDrop until you turn the feature back on.

1. Open the Settings app and choose Screen Time from the main list.
2. Tap Content & Privacy Restrictions.
3. Enable Content & Privacy Restrictions and then tap Allowed Apps & Features.
4. Toggle off the switch for AirDrop.

Doing so will restrict AirDrop on this iPhone or iPad, which also removes the AirDrop icon from the systemwide share sheet and the Settings > General section.

Check out next:

• How to add an AirDrop shortcut to the Mac Dock for quicker access
• iOS restricts AirDrop’s Everyone option to 10 minutes for all users globally
• Samsung’s AirDrop-like feature lets you share content with five people simultaneously