Apple's AI Photo Editing Features: Capabilities and Limitations

iPhone users are about to get their hands on full-fledged native AI photo editing features for the first time. The era has finally arrived in which smartphones equipped with the world's most widely used camera will have comprehensive AI photo editing features as standard.

The new AI photo editing features implemented in iOS 27 remain relatively modest compared to those already provided by Google's 'Pixel' series. Nevertheless, from the perspective of what iPhone's standard Photos app can do with users' photos, this clearly marks a turning point. Photos are both a 'record' and a 'memory' at the same time. Which of these will we allow AI to rewrite?—Perhaps we ourselves have not yet found an answer.

It should be noted that the new features are currently included in the iOS 27 developer beta version, and Apple may make further adjustments before public release. The features are being offered as three, or two and something else, and verification is still ongoing regarding the details.

The arrival of AI photo editing features poses a fundamental question about the nature of smartphone photography. As technology to erase subjects, change backgrounds, or 'fill in' things that never existed becomes a standard feature, will photos we take truly remain a 'record of reality'? Google's Pixel has already been at the center of this question, but as iPhone, the world's largest smartphone platform, steps into this realm, the discussion will become broader and deeper.

Apple has thus far demonstrated an emphasis on users' 'intent' and 'integrity' in photo editing. How this new feature reconciles with, or fails to reconcile with, that philosophy will be difficult to judge until after the official release. While still in the developer beta stage, the 'adoption phase' of AI photo editing has quietly, yet undoubtedly, begun.