The Camera Icon in the iPhone Keyboard Is Covering Your Text: How to Remove It

A camera button at the end of the keyboard's toolbar is useful exactly once, and after that it takes a line of the screen you are trying to read. Owners who type long messages notice it most: the toolbar and the prediction row together can consume a third of the visible text area on a smaller phone.

Whether you can remove it depends on who draws it. There are three possibilities, and they have different answers: the system keyboard's own toolbar, a third-party keyboard's toolbar, or the app's input accessory sitting above the keyboard. Working out which one you are looking at is most of the fix.

Finding out who draws the button

The first row is the one people miss. If the camera icon appears in Messages but not in Notes, you are not looking at a keyboard problem at all, and no amount of keyboard settings will move it.

What to try, in order

1. Step 1 Compare two apps before changing anything

   Type a long paragraph in Notes, then the same paragraph in the app where the icon bothers you. If the toolbar looks different, the app is drawing it; if it looks the same, the keyboard is.

2. Step 2 Reclaim the prediction row

   In Settings, then General, then Keyboard, turn off Predictive Text and inline predictions. That removes a full row rather than a single button, and it is the only real space you can win back from the system keyboard.

3. Step 3 Switch keyboards for a minute

   Add or remove a keyboard in the same menu and compare. A minimal third-party keyboard may not draw a toolbar at all, which is a real fix if you can live without system suggestions.

4. Step 4 Use the app's full-screen editor where one exists

   Mail drafts, long notes and some chat apps open a dedicated editing view that gives the text field the whole screen. It is a workaround, but a reliable one.

5. Step 5 Change text size rather than the keyboard

   Settings, Display and Brightness, Text Size. A smaller size fits more lines above the toolbar, though it changes the whole system rather than the app you were typing in.

6. Step 6 Update the app, then report it

   If the row belongs to the app, an update is the only fix you can expect. Report it with a screenshot: layout complaints are usually triaged by how many people describe the same thing.

Settings that quietly make it worse

• Larger text combined with Display Zoom leaves fewer lines visible before the toolbar starts.
• Two keyboards with toolbars - a third-party one above the system one - can stack two rows.
• Emoji, dictation and camera buttons usually share one bar, so removing a single one is rarely possible.
• Rotating to landscape hides the problem rather than solving it, and makes the line length worse.
• Third-party "keyboard fix" apps cannot change a system toolbar; they simply add another keyboard.
• Accessibility settings such as Button Shapes or Larger Text change spacing in ways that can push the row upward.

Can I hide just the camera button?

On builds where the toolbar is fixed, there is no switch that removes one button. You can hide the prediction row, or use a keyboard that does not draw that bar, but those are different trades: one removes suggestions, the other replaces the keyboard entirely.

Why does it only happen in one app?

Because that app is drawing its own accessory above the keyboard. The system keyboard is only the lower layer, and an app is free to add a row of its own above it - which is why the setting you are looking for does not exist.

Will a different keyboard give me the space back?

Sometimes. A minimal third-party keyboard can remove the toolbar, but it also gives up the system's suggestions, dictation behaviour and privacy model. Test it for a day before you commit to it.

Does turning off Predictive Text break autocorrect?

No. Autocorrect, auto-capitalisation and check spelling are separate switches in the same menu, so you can keep corrections while removing the suggestion row.