Apple puts unpairing on the list before the erase, not after — and the ordering is the instruction rather than a suggestion about tidiness.
System tower · floor
How to reset iPhone to factory settings, and what comes first
The reset itself is four taps. What can go wrong with how to reset iphone to factory settings is almost all in what you do before making them — and Apple sets the order out in a list that sits on a different page from the button.
Settings › General › Transfer or Reset iPhone › Erase All Content and Settings
That is the button — and it is worth noticing what it sits beside. The same Transfer or Reset iPhone screen also holds Reset Network Settings, Reset All Settings and Delete All eSIMs: narrower operations, one tap away from the irreversible one. If you came here to fix a single stubborn thing rather than to hand the phone over, the button you want is not the one below.
Now the part that matters, starting with the thing not to do.
Apple puts this near the top, before any instruction, and it contradicts the first instinct almost
everybody has. Do not tidy the phone up before erasing it. Deleting the photos you would
rather a stranger did not see does not remove them from the phone you are selling — it removes them
from your account, your iPad and your computer as well. The erase at the end handles the phone.
Nothing needs deleting by hand first.“When you’re logged into iCloud with your Apple Account, manually deleting items will
permanently remove them. This includes contacts, calendars, reminders, documents, and photos
from iCloud servers and all your connected devices.”
That warning is worth sitting with, because the instinct it contradicts is a good one. You are about to hand a phone to a stranger; going through the photos and messages first feels like basic care. On a device signed in to iCloud it is the opposite — every deletion propagates, and the things you removed for the sake of privacy are gone from the account you are keeping. The erase does not need help.
Apple’s order, and every step in it exists for a reason
Three of those eight are on none of the reset screens, which is what makes them easy to walk past.
Apple’s condition is specific: if you are switching to a non-Apple phone, deregister it. Only that case, and it is a step on its own rather than part of signing out.
Apple’s note: “If you aren’t using a SIM card with your device, you can contact your carrier to get help transferring service to the new owner.”
The AppleCare step deserves a line of its own because it is money. Apple presents two options — cancel the plan, or transfer it to the new owner. Both are documented, both take a few minutes, and the one thing that helps nobody is discovering months later that you are still paying for cover on a phone in somebody else’s pocket.
And one screen where the wording has changed and matters. Signing out of iCloud in iOS 26
or later does not just sign you out: Apple says you “choose Erase this [Device] or Sign Out But
Don’t Erase.” Two buttons, two outcomes, and one of them leaves things behind — Apple links to a separate page
on “what data stays on your device when you choose Sign Out But Don’t Erase.” On a phone you are
handing to somebody else, that is not the button. On earlier versions the same screen simply asks
for the Apple Account password and offers Turn Off.
The last step on the list is the one that happens after the phone has left. Remove the old device from your list of trusted devices. Until you do, a machine you no longer own is still named on your Apple Account as somewhere codes can go. It is the last step on Apple’s list, and it happens somewhere other than the phone.
A word on the version of this search that is really a different question. If the phone is not yours, or you cannot get past a passcode or an Apple Account you did not set up, none of the above applies and no page can help. Activation Lock is doing what it was built to do, and the route runs through the person whose account it is. That is not this floor being unhelpful: it is the lock doing the job it exists for.
The floors below take it four ways: the tidying that must not happen, the order of the eight steps, the three that get forgotten, and what to do when the phone is already gone.
Where to start
Four ways in.
- “I was about to delete my photos first.”
- Start at do not tidy first
- “What order do I do this in?”
- Go to the eight steps
- “What am I going to forget?”
- That is the forgotten three
- “I have already handed it over.”
- That is after it has gone
Do not tidy first
The instinct to clean a phone before erasing it is exactly wrong on an account signed in to iCloud. Apple says so above the instructions.
Why deleting propagatesOne deletion, every device, and the account you are keeping.Being built
Back it up firstThe only step on Apple’s list that cannot be done afterwards.Open this floor →
Moving to the new phoneQuick Start, and the trusted phone number to add if the number is changing.Open this floor →
The eight steps
Apple’s own sequence. The erase is the seventh of them, which is the point — almost everything that matters happens before you tap it.
Erase All Content and SettingsThe four taps at the end, and what the screen asks for on the way.Being built
Signing out of iCloudTwo buttons in iOS 26, and only one of them is right for a phone you are giving away.Being built
Find My and Activation LockThe lock that decides whether the next person gets a phone or a brick.Open this floor →
The smaller resets next to itThe same menu holds resets that keep your data — worth knowing which one you actually need.Open this floor →
The forgotten three
A Watch, a message service and a SIM. None of them is on the reset screen, and each one causes a separate kind of trouble later.
Unpairing the Apple WatchBefore the erase rather than after, and why the order is not arbitrary.Being built
Deregistering iMessageApple’s condition is specific: only when the next phone is not an Apple one.Being built
AppleCareCancel it or transfer it — Apple offers both, and one of them is worth money.Being built
After it has gone
Two steps that happen once the phone is out of your hands, and one situation where none of this is available at all.
Trusted devicesA phone you no longer own, still listed as somewhere your codes can arrive.Being built
Erasing it remotelyWhat Apple offers when the device is already with somebody else.Being built
A phone that is not yoursWhere the honest answer stops, and whose account the route runs through.Being built
What this tower will not do
It will not tell you to delete your photos before selling the phone. Apple’s own warning is that on an iCloud account those deletions follow you home.
It will not describe a way past Activation Lock. It exists to make a phone worth less to somebody who took it, and it does that job.
And it will not treat the erase as the whole task. It is the seventh of Apple’s eight steps, and the ones on either side of it are where the trouble is. What holds instead is simple: the warning about deletions propagating, the eight-step order, the Finish Repair check and the sign-out choices are quoted from Apple’s own documentation, listed below.
Where this page got its facts
- Apple Support — What to do before you sell, give away, or trade in your iPhone or iPad (the warning that manually deleting items while signed in to iCloud removes them from iCloud servers and all connected devices, the ordered list of steps, the trusted phone numbers note, the Parts and Service History and Finish Repair check, unpairing an Apple Watch, cancelling or transferring AppleCare, the iOS 26 sign-out choice between Erase this Device and Sign Out But Don’t Erase, deregistering iMessage when switching to a non-Apple phone, the Settings route to Erase All Content and Settings, the carrier note about service, and removing the device from your trusted devices) — support.apple.com, read 22 August 2026.
Written by Alberto Gulotta
Founder and editor of AI Tools Primer, writing from Palermo, Italy. Thirty-five years of taking computers apart, starting with a Commodore 64 — the long version is on the about page.
Something wrong on this page? Write to aitoolsprimer@gmail.com and it gets fixed.
Written on 22 August 2026.
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