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The Google Photos app is definitely one of the best free photo editing apps out there, offering features like Magic Eraser, Photo Unblur, Portrait Light, and more for free. The app was launched in 2015, and since then it has been the go-to option for many users to store and manage photos. You can imagine the popularity of Google Photos by looking at the recently released usage numbers from Google. According to them, Google Photos is used by more than 1.5 billion people each month. Considering the Worldometer shows that the current population of the world is 8.2 billion. More than 18% use Google Photos every month. This is a huge number.
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On May 28, 2025, Google Photos will celebrate its 10th anniversary. To celebrate, Google announced they would be bringing two AI editing tools to the iOS version later this year. These features were previously available only on Pixel devices. These features will allow you to edit your photos professionally without any prior editing experience. Let’s see what these Google AI features do and how to use. Google Photos on iPhone will soon have AI features exclusive to Google Pixel
Reimagine, Auto Frame and other features will be added to the iOS version. These features were introduced for the first time at the 2024 Made by Google Event alongside the Pixel 9 Series. The Reimagine feature lets you alter the background and objects of an image by using text prompts. The Auto Frame feature, on the other hand, uses AI to suggest how to frame your photos. Let’s first see how to use Reimagine:
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- Open Google Photos on your iPhone, and select the image that you want edit.
- Tap on the Edit button located at the bottom of your screen.
- Select the Magic Editor icon at the bottom left corner.
- Now circle the subject you wish to reimagine. Tap the Reimage button at the bottom-right corner.
- Enter the text you want to be added to the selected area. Then, tap on the continue icon.
It will take the Google Photos app a few moments to generate the output that is relevant to the prompt. You’ll see multiple results. Choose the one you like best. To use the Auto Frame function, follow these steps.
- Select the photo you want to use Auto Frame on in the Google Photos app.
- Select Magic Eraser from the Edit button.
- Click the Preset icon in the bottom-center corner of the screen. Select Auto Frame from the menu.
Auto Frame will take a few moments to generate multiple suggestions for the image you have selected. Tap the Done icon at the bottom-right corner after selecting the suggestion you want.
Google Photos Android app to get new features
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In addition to iOS, the Reimagine and Auto Frame features are also coming to all Android smartphones. Fortunately for Android users, these features will roll out in June this year, unlike on iOS, where they’re coming later this year. Besides these two features, Google is introducing a few other capabilities for the Android version of its Photos app.
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First, the Photos app is getting a UI overhaul to make it easier for you to access its editing tools and AI-driven features. You can now create a QR code for albums and share it with your friends. They’ll be able to view as well as add new photos to the album just by scanning the QR code. You’ll find a new “Places” option under the Collection tab; tapping it will show pictures pinned on the map. This will eventually make it easy to recognize the place where the pictures were taken. If you can’t find a particular picture in the Photos app, then you can now search for it using natural prompts, like “me in a narrow black shirt.”
Similar to the memories feature of the Apple Photos app, the Google Photos app will now also regularly create a collection of photos. You’ll also be able to create short highlight clips using photos and videos stored in the Photos app. The Photos app will use AI to combine the selected photos and videos into a single video with suitable background music.
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Along with all these, the Google Photos app will let you stack similar photos, customize your memories collection, and free up some space using the “Free up space on this device” option. Again, all these features will be rolled out globally to the Google Photos Android app in June.
