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You are here: Home / Photography / How to Reset Your Canon Rebel T3i to Factory Default Settings

How to Reset Your Canon Rebel T3i to Factory Default Settings

October 20, 2016

If you own a DSLR camera, you probably know that you can customize many of its available settings. There are tons of things you can change, from the quality of the photos you take to which buttons you press to auto-focus to how you control the flash. It’s because of this type of customization, amateur and professional photographers alike love their cameras. The camera truly becomes an extension of the human.

There is a small problem with all this potential customization through. As with many things in life, with great power comes great responsibility. If we mess around with the settings on our cameras too much, there’s the possibility of getting lost and having no idea of what we changed and how to get things back to where they were in the beginning.

Now, I completely understand the temptation of customizing your camera. Part of the issue lies with the tons and tons of tutorials one can find online. Someone writes or records a video that talks about how to make the beep sound at this time and someone else writes or records something quite the opposite. Many early photographers fall for the bait of having too much accessible information and start customizing things that they really have no need to customize.

People do this either the way I just described (with help) or they do it all by themselves. There’s a trick to things like this. You need to learn about what settings actually do before you start changing them to what you think you might like or how someone else suggests. And if you do get yourself in a pickle, you should really try your hardest to undo what you did manually. You’ll likely learn a lot in the process. Yet, I completely understand the limitations of time as well. There are times when you just want to get things done and reset the dam camera.

In today’s post, I’ll cover the steps necessary to reset your Canon Rebel T3i to its factory default settings. It’s really rather simple, so read on below. Also, please be aware that if you have another camera from the Canon Rebel series (T2i, T4i, T5i, T6i or the T7i), most of what I write below will apply to it as well.

Resetting the Camera’s Settings

Before I begin, I want to remind you that the menu options in your camera change depending on what mode you currently have the camera set to. With some settings, the options I’m going to use below aren’t available. Before I begin, I’ll set my camera to P, or Program mode. If you’re following along with your own camera, you should do the same.

Canon Rebel T3i Program Mode Settings

To start off, I’ll press the Menu button on the back of the camera. In the photo below, I’ve got this button circled in red. It’s in the upper left portion of the picture.

Canon Rebel T3i Camera Controls

I also circled the arrow controls I’ll be using in the next few steps. These arrows are what I’m going to use to move from menu option to menu option. Once I move to the option I’d like to use, I’ll press the Set button, which lies in the center of the arrows.


When I press the Menu button on the back of the camera, I’ll see one of the settings screens appear. I’ll push the left or right arrow buttons to bring me to the right-most Tools menu. This menu is characterized by a small wrench in the tab and will have the Clear Settings option available as one of the selections.

Settings Tools Screen

Next, I’ll use the down arrow button to move to the Clear Settings option. Once I’m there, I’ll push the Set button.

Clear Settings Menu Option

This will bring me to the next screen that contains further options.


Clear All Camera Settings

I’ll select the Clear All Camera Settings option by pushing the Set button once again. Doing this will bring me to the confirmation screen.

Clear Settings Confirmation Screen

I’ll use the right arrow button to move to the OK option and then I’ll press the Set button again. After that, the camera will take a second or two to clear out any settings I changed and will bring me back to their initial default modes.

To finish things up, I’ll back out of the menu area by either pressing the Menu button the number of times it takes me to get out or I’ll simply half-press the shutter button. Pressing that button while in the menu area will immediately remove me and bring me back to camera mode.

Well, there you have it. I hope I thoroughly explained how to reset your Canon Rebel T3i camera settings to their defaults. If you have any questions or concerns, please leave them in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Related posts:

  1. How Do I Set the Timer On My Canon Rebel Camera?
  2. How Can I Set My Canon Rebel T3i to Continuous Shooting Mode?
  3. How to Reset Edit Settings Back to Default in Adobe Camera Raw
  4. Canon Rebel T7i Shooting Settings by Mode
  5. How to Change & Limit ISO Settings on a Canon Rebel T6i DSLR Camera

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Comments

  1. Doug says

    March 5, 2017 at 10:20 am

    Just did this for my wife’s Canon as a friend had it all wacked out. Thanks for the quick and easy reset.

    Reply
    • Jay Gaulard says

      March 5, 2017 at 11:36 am

      Awesome! Great to hear this Doug.

      Reply
  2. Christiane Molare says

    March 22, 2017 at 7:29 pm

    Thank you so much for this information! I had screwed up the setting on my Rebel. So thank you for quick and easy reset… Now I can go back in and reset to take some jewelry pics.

    Thanks again

    Chris

    Reply
    • Jay Gaulard says

      March 22, 2017 at 7:34 pm

      Hi Chris,

      No problem! I’m glad I could help. Good luck with your shots.

      Jay

      Reply
  3. Vicki says

    May 23, 2018 at 6:09 pm

    You’re instructions were exactly what I needed. Thanks for sharing and making it simple to follow! Have a great day!!

    Reply
    • Jay Gaulard says

      May 23, 2018 at 6:17 pm

      Hi Vicki!

      I love this comment and I love that I helped you out. Good luck with your photography!

      Jay

      Reply
  4. Amanda Jones says

    August 13, 2018 at 2:41 pm

    Thank you. I purchased a used camera from a professional (who left all the settings they liked) and I did exactly what you said, I went in willy-nilly changing settings trying to get back to default.

    Thank you for this quick tutorial. It really did save me hours of time.

    Reply
  5. joan baum says

    September 3, 2018 at 8:25 pm

    hi jay. i just followed your easy and helpful reset directions but this camera just won’t won’t. I aim it at a subject and it just makes a click click noise and no photo. If i aim it down at the floor i get a photo of my tiles. beyond frustrating. this camera belonged to my daughter and we haven’t used it for a while due to her messing up the settings and losing the memory card. i bought a new card today in the hopes that my younger daughter could use this camera for her high school photography class. about to throw in the towel. can you help? joan

    Reply
    • Jay Gaulard says

      September 3, 2018 at 8:31 pm

      Hi Joan,

      I really can’t be sure what the issue is with your camera. Is there a local camera shop you can bring it to? I’d hate to see you give up on it if it’s something easy to fix. I do find it strange that you’re able to take a photo when the camera is pointed at the floor though. It’s almost as if the shutter is sticking in the upright position. I would experiment with which ways you’re taking the photos. First, try it through the viewfinder and then try using the LCD screen in the back of the camera. I wonder if there will be a difference. Also, what mode are you in? Are you using auto-focus or manual focus? Try switching between the two to see if there’s a difference. Please let me know what happens. Thanks!

      Jay

      Reply
  6. Evi says

    April 4, 2020 at 2:53 am

    Hello Jay,

    Perhaps this is a silly question but by doing this, I won’t remove the pictures from my SD-card right?
    Just to be sure…

    Thank you!

    Reply
    • Jay Gaulard says

      April 4, 2020 at 9:26 am

      Hi Evi,

      I don’t believe your photos will be removed from your card. Just to be sure though, remove the card from the camera and then go through the instructions for resetting your camera. You should be able to do this with no card in the camera. Let me know how you make out.

      Thanks!

      Jay

      Reply

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