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So, I've decided not to store my health data in iCloud anymore, for various reasons. I just want to have it on my iPhone and on my iPhone backup on my Mac.

Here's what I have tried so far:

So I turned off Health in iCloud on my iPhone and hoped it would delete all the Health data from my iCloud account. It didn't though, here's a screenshot:

iCloud settings iPhone Screenshot

It seems like it only stopped backing up new data but the old data remains online. So I tried to delete it via the iCloud settings on my Mac, which gives me this prompt: Mac iCloud settings screenshot

(Note: There is no Health folder in Finder iCloud Drive). Is it safe to click delete or will it also wipe all my data from my iPhone and Apple Watch Health apps? And if this operation deletes it everywhere, where can I delete it on iCloud only?

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  • The dialog states if you continue with deletion of the data from iCloud, that "All 'Health' documents & data will be deleted immediately from iCloud and all of your devices." Is this unclear?
    – DavidRecallsMonica
    Commented Mar 5, 2021 at 15:50
  • @DavidSupportsMonica it kind of is. Since iCloud is a syncing service, I would suppose it deletes the data from synced devices. So therefore, the data on my iPhone should be safe (since health is not synced over icloud). And if indeed it deletes it everywhere, where can I delete it on iCloud only? (Clarified the question above)
    – Aaron
    Commented Mar 5, 2021 at 15:53
  • iCloud is indeed a syncing service, and almost always, when data is deleted from iCloud, gives the user the opportunity to have the data remain on connected devices. It's significant that with regard to Health data, Apple says that data on devices will instead be deleted. Thus, your supposition "should be safe" is incorrect. Perhaps what you really want to know is how you can save the data to a non-iCloud place before deletion from iCloud. If that's your real query, please ask it as another question.
    – DavidRecallsMonica
    Commented Mar 5, 2021 at 15:59
  • @DavidSupportsMonica no, I want to keep it on my iPhone in my Health app, not as some weird file on my computer. I just want to delete it from iCloud.
    – Aaron
    Commented Mar 5, 2021 at 16:05
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    Let me say it a different way: Apple has programmed Health.app and iCloud so that deleting Health data and info from iCloud will automatically delete the same data and info from all your devices. What you want to do (remove data and info from iCloud only) can't be done directly. If you want the data and info on your devices but not on iCloud, you must remove the data and info from iCloud, then manually reload the data and info into each instance of Health.app. It might be easier to reload if you had a copy, hence my mention of moving the data to a "non-iCloud" place before iCloud deletion.
    – DavidRecallsMonica
    Commented Mar 5, 2021 at 16:22

1 Answer 1

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Health Syncing in iCloud will not appear in iCloud Backups or in iCloud Drive. It is stored directly in iCloud rather than in iCloud Drive or other sub-service.

If you turn off the Health switch on your phone, then you have disconnected the local Health repository from the cloud. You can safely delete your Cloud health data after doing this.

Health data is stored End-to-End encrypted, unlike backups. The article you linked to refers to iCloud Backups, a different system. When you turn off the Health switch, it will start backing Health up to the non-end-to-end encrypted iCloud Backup. You must also turn off the Health feature in iCloud Backup to avoid this.

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The phrasing on the Mac is different and likely flawed. The same delete button you've shown on the phone makes it clear that you're only deleting it in iCloud, not per-device.

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