Google Photos

Google next month will stop providing unlimited free backup in Photos. Although existing Pixel phones are exempted, future devices — as of today — will miss out on a great perk that helps emphasize the camera. An update to Google Photos today reveals apparent work on a new “Storage saver” tier that will be “free and unlimited” for Pixel.

With the launch of the Pixel 5 and 4a 5G last year, Google also rolled out a redesigned Photos editor on Android. The video experience has since been similarly revamped, while Google Photos is now rolling out new “Sharpen” and “Denoise” tools.

Google Photos remains one of the best places to store your pictures online, and now it’s getting a useful tweak. A silent update to the Google Photos app, at least on Android, allows users to add content to an album even when they’re offline.

Despite incoming costs, Google Photos may remain one of the best places to store your pictures thanks to its useful search functions. Now, Google Photos is testing another useful search feature, a filter that picks out photos of documents such as receipts, business cards, and more.

Besides being its own app, Google Lens is also available in Image Search, Photos, and integrated across Android. Google is now bringing Lens to the desktop web inside Google Photos for convenient text copying through optical character recognition (OCR).

Google Photos has gone through some serious alterations and edits over the years, but the latest minor but appreciated change is the addition of labels to each of the editing tool icons.

A brand-new addition to the growing Google Photos Memories collections might have you gasping for a beer as it highlights the best pulled pints and potentially saying “cheers.”

Google Lens has long been part of Google Photos to help you visually search images. On Android, Google Lens is now a more prominent part of Photos by identifying what pictures would benefit from the analysis and search tool.

Following last year’s big Android and iOS revamp, Google Photos on the web is getting a matching “Explore” tab and “Favorites” shortcut.

As part of the Google Photos growing AI-generated Memories collections, a new “Best of Winter 2020” selection is rolling out within the gallery app on Android.

The AI-generated Google Photos Memories collections continue to grow with a bar game billiards or pool-focused “Let’s Play” grouping for images of you and your friends playing the popular table games.

Google One primarily serves to give you more storage space for Gmail, Drive, and Photos. Last year, the subscription added a VPN and is now providing all Android users with access to “enhanced” Google Photos editing tools and filters that were previously only available on Pixel phones.

One of the biggest changes you’ll find in Android 11 is one that sits behind the scenes. Scoped Storage is a major security upgrade for the OS, but it has some slightly irritating side effects. On Google Photos, for example, Android 11 devices put up a second prompt when trying to delete a photo, but now there’s a workaround.