Turn Off AI on Pinterest

Quick answer: Pinterest has no single switch that turns off all of its AI. Its help names three settings. The Show AI content toggle under Refine your recommendations turns off every AI topic in your feed. The “see fewer” AI Pins option in a Pin’s ellipsis menu covers one kind of Pin. Use your data to train Pinterest Canvas (Settings › Privacy and data) keeps what you save and upload out of its image model’s training. The AI modified label is Pinterest’s own and no setting hides it; a wrong one on your own Pin is appealed through its contact form. The tool above gives Pinterest’s steps for whichever one you want, on your device.

Can you turn off AI on Pinterest?

Not with one switch, and not completely: Pinterest’s words for these settings are “reduce” and “see fewer”. The nearest thing to an off switch is in Refine your recommendations: Use the Show AI content toggle to reduce AI content in your feed. If you turn this toggle off, all AI topics will be turned off. It changes what Pinterest recommends to you. The other two settings cover one kind of Pin and the training of Pinterest’s own model.

See fewer AI Pins in your feed

On the web the AI content tab reads AI content: Choose to see fewer GenAI Pins in certain categories in your feed. In the Android and iPhone apps it reads AI content: Choose the GenAI interests you want to see less of. Below the toggle are the topics one by one: You can also manually turn individual topics on or off under the Manage AI content by topic section. Pinterest’s help does not list the topics; you see them on that screen. The same page has an Activity tab for the rest of your feed, and the Reset Your Pinterest Home Feed tool covers searches, follows and ads as well.

See fewer Pins like one AI Pin

Pinterest’s article See fewer AI Pins puts it this way: To help tailor your recommendation feeds, you have the option to “see fewer” AI-generated or modified Pins in certain popular categories. You open the ellipsis icon at the bottom right of the Pin in your feed and choose the “see fewer” AI Pins option. This will send a signal to our systems to recommend less of this type of content. The article says “the above categories” but never lists them, so it does not say which Pins offer the option.

Stop Pinterest training its AI on your Pins

Pinterest Canvas is Pinterest’s own image model (Manage GenAI settings): We train Pinterest Canvas on certain publicly available data that users save or upload to the platform. When you save or upload content to Pinterest, we may use it to improve the accuracy, safety and overall performance of Pinterest Canvas. You can opt out of this use of your data at any time. The setting is Use your data to train Pinterest Canvas under Privacy and data, a box on the web and a toggle in the apps. Note: If you're under 18, you'll automatically be opted out of this setting and unable to opt in.

How much it has been trained on is in AI at Pinterest: Pinterest Canvas has been trained on approximately 500,000,000 rows of publicly available Pins, Pin descriptions, and Pin metadata that Pinterest users have saved or uploaded to Pinterest, to which the users have granted Pinterest a license, as well as the continuous use of synthetic data. The data in the datasets were collected by Pinterest as early as 2009 and were first used in the development of Pinterest Canvas in or around January 2023. The data collection is ongoing. Pinterest’s help does not say whether unchecking the box removes Pins that were already used.

What the “AI modified” label means

From Gen AI labels: When our system detects via the metadata on a Pin that it's been generated or modified using AI, we add a Gen AI label to it. If our system detects that AI was used to generate or modify a Pin that isn't in a promoted state, you'll see an AI modified label in close-up at the bottom left after you click on the Pin. Metadata is not the only signal: To do this, we not only analyze a Pin’s metadata following the IPTC Metadata Standard, but also developed classifiers that automatically detect Gen AI content, even if the content doesn’t have obvious markers. In addition, some Pins may also have the AI modified label if the content owner indicated that the Pin was generated or modified using AI.

Ads show it elsewhere: For ads, the Gen AI label won't appear when you click on the Pin. Instead, you can see the label along with other details about the ad by clicking or tapping the ellipsis icon next to the Pin. The disclosure will say the Pin was modified with AI or if it contains an AI-generated person based on what the content owner has indicated, or that the Pin may be modified with AI if Pinterest’s systems flagged the content.

If your own Pin got the label by mistake

If you find an AI label on one of your Pins and want to appeal it, contact our support team. Pinterest’s link opens its contact form on the Gen AI label appeal (the tool above links it under “A wrong label on my Pin”). Pinterest’s detection is not only the file’s metadata, so a Pin can be labelled even when its file says nothing about AI.

What has no off switch

Pinterest has used machine learning to pick Pins far longer than it has made images: For example, we use it to recommend and show the most relevant ideas across home feed, search and related feeds. The Activity tab changes part of that: Activity: Turn off recommendations based on Pins you have engaged with. Pinterest’s help names no setting for the AI backgrounds advertisers make with Canvas, or for its help chat: Right now our only GenAI support tool is our GenAI chatbot. To improve our products and services, human reviewers may read, annotate, and process your conversations.

If you pin for a business

The label reaches your Pins too, from your file’s metadata, from Pinterest’s detection or from what you tell it, and on an ad it sits in the ad’s details behind the ellipsis icon. Readers who turn off Show AI content are telling Pinterest what they want less of, so a Pin that is not AI-made and not labelled is not what they switched off.

FAQ