Photos comes with every Mac and provides powerful, easy-to-use editing tools along with photo organization and sharing features. Use Photos to perfect your images, and don't be afraid to explore all of the tools — if you don't like a change you made, you can go back to the original photo any time.
- My Photo Editor App
- Photography Editing Apps For Mac
- Free Photo Editing Tool
- Free Photo Editing Software
Before you begin
Click Done on the top right of the Photos window.; How to access white balance, noise reduction, and more in Photos for Mac. Histogram, sharpen, definition, noise reduction, vignette, white balance, and levels can all be added to your photo adjustment options; that elevates Photos for Mac from a basic photo editing tool to something more advanced.
- Update the software on your Mac to make sure that you're using the latest version of macOS.
- To ensure that all of your photos are available for editing, turn on iCloud Photos on your Mac and your other devices.
- Photo editing tools free download - ACDSee Pro 3, GraphicConverter, Picasa, and many more programs.
- The best free photo editing software for Mac isn't lacking features. These image editors have high-quality features to help you create great pictures. These features mean that Pinta is also a viable tool for users looking for an application to allow them to edit and improve their digital photos.
iCloud Photos keeps your photos organized and up to date everywhere that you use it. So any edits that you make on your Mac appear on your other devices too.
Special tool for removing keyboard keys on a mac. Result Windows Mac OS Go to Library module Ctrl + Alt + 1 Command + Option + 1 Go to Develop module Ctrl + Alt + 2 Command + Option + 2 Go to Slideshow module Ctrl + Alt + 3 Command + Option + 3 Go to Print module Ctrl + Alt + 4 Command + Option + 4 Go to Web module Ctrl + Alt + 5 Command + Option + 5 Go back / go forward Ctrl + Alt + Left Arrow / Ctrl + Alt + RIght Arrow Command + Option + Left Arrow / Command + Option + Right Arrow Go back to previous module Ctrl + Alt + Up Arrow Command + Option + Up Arrow.
Get started
To open a photo in Edit view, double-click a photo in your library, then click Edit in the toolbar. You can also select a photo and pressCommand-Return to open a photo in Edit view. Click a tab in the middle of the toolbar to select from the three groups of editing tools: Adjust, Filters, and Crop.
The toolbar also has buttons for editing with extensions and quickly rotating or enhancing your photo.
While you edit, you can use the slider on the toolbar's left side to zoom in on your photo for greater detail. When you finish making your adjustments, click Done.
Adjust
Use the powerful tools in Adjust to fine-tune your photo's light, color, sharpness, and more. Use sliders or the Auto button to easily adjust your photo — or dive deeper with detailed controls.
Click the triangle next to each Adjust tool's name to show its controls. Some tools allow even more detailed adjustments; click the triangle next to Options to see everything the tool offers.
You can toggle individual adjustments on and off by clicking the blue circle that appears next to each tool when it's expanded or when hover your pointer over it.
If you want to apply the adjustments you make from one photo to another, just copy and paste them. Open the photo that has the adjustments that you want, click Edit, and choose Image > Copy Adjustments. Then open the photo you want to apply the edits to, click Edit, and choose Image > Paste Adjustments.
Filters
The nine filters in Photos emulate three classic photography styles — vivid, dramatic, and black and white — and are optimized to enhance your image while keeping skin tones natural.
Choose Vivid, Vivid Warm, or Vivid Cool to enhance the vibrancy of your images; Dramatic, Dramatic Warm, or Dramatic Cool to add contrast; or Mono, Silvertone, or Noir for a classic black and white.
Crop
Straighten your photo, improve its composition, or get rid of parts that you don't want.
Drag the selection rectangle by its edges or corners. When you let go of the selection rectangle, your cropped photo appears. Use the numbered dial to the right of your photo to straighten it. As you move the dial, a grid appears on your photo to help you with alignment.
Aspect
Choose from a range of ratios — like square or 5:7 — or leave it as freeform.
Flip
Horizontally flip your photo, or option-click to flip it vertically.
Photos can also automatically straighten and crop your photo — just click the Auto button. Or click Reset to undo all cropping and rotation and restore your photo to its original dimensions.
Edit with third-party apps
You can edit images from your Photos library with third-party apps, such as Photoshop and Pixelmator, right from the Photos app. Select an image, then choose Image > Edit With and choose the editing app that you'd like to use.
When you're finished editing in the app, save your work or use the Command-S keyboard shortcut. Any edits you make are saved in Photos as a non-destructive change, so you can always revert your image to its original state.
More editing tools
Extensions
Third-party extensions expand your editing options in Photos. You can apply edits from multiple extensions to one photo, or use any combination of extensions plus the editing tools built into Photos. Learn more about editing with third-party extensions.
You can also use the Markup tool in the Extensions menu to add drawings, shapes, and text to your photos.
Rotate
Turn your photo 90 degrees counterclockwise. If you want to rotate the other direction, hold down the Option key.
Enhance
Improve your photo with just one click. Automatically adjust your photo's color, light, and contrast.
Learn more
What Kind of Photo Editing Software Do You Need?
Whether you merely shoot with your smartphone or you're a professional photographer with a studio, you need software to organize and edit your photos. We all know that camera technology is improving at a tremendous rate. Today's smartphones are more powerful than the point-and-shoots of just a few years ago. The same can be said for photo editing software. 'Photoshopping' pictures is no longer the exclusive province of art directors and professional photographers. Disk format tool for mac. Whether you're shooting from an iPhone XS or a DSLR, if you really care how your photos look, you'll want to import them into your PC to organize them, pick the best ones, perfect them, and print or share them online. Here we present the best choices in photo editing software to suit every photographer, from the casual to the professional.
My Photo Editor App
Of course, novice shooters will want different software from those shooting with a $50,000 Phase One IQ3 in a studio. We've included all levels of PC software here, however, and reading the linked reviews will make it clear which is for you. Nothing says that pros can't occasionally use an entry-level application or that a prosumer won't be running Photoshop, the most powerful image editor around. The issue is that, in general, users at each of these levels will be most comfortable with the products that are intended for them.
Note that in the table above, it's not a case of 'more checks mean the program is better.' Rather, it's designed to give you the quick overview of the products. A product with everything checked doesn't necessarily have the best implementation of those features, and one with fewer checks still may be very capable, and whether you even need the checked feature depends on your photo workflow. For example, DxO Photolab may not have face recognition or keyword tagging, but it has the finest noise reduction in the land and some of the best camera- and lens-based profile corrections.
Free Photo Editing Options
So you've graduated from smartphone photography tools like those offered by Instagram and Facebook. Does that mean you have to pay a ton for high-end software? Absolutely not. Up-to-date desktop operating systems include photo software at no extra cost. The Microsoft Photos app included with Windows 10 may surprise some users with its capabilities. In a touch-friendly interface, it offers a good level of image correction, autotagging, blemish removal, face recognition, and raw camera file support. It can even automatically create editable albums based on photos' dates and locations.
Apple Photos does those things too, though its automatic albums aren't as editable. Both programs also sync with online storage services: iCloud for Apple and OneDrive for Microsoft. With Apple Photos, you can search based on detected object types, like 'tree' or 'cat' in the application (Microsoft Photos now offers this feature, too). Apple Photos also can integrate with plugins like the excellent Perfectly Clear, appeasing power users who lament the company's discontinuation of the prosumer-level Aperture program.
Ubuntu Linux users are also covered when it comes to free, included photo software: They can use the capable-enough Shotwell app. And no discussion of free photo editing software would be complete without mentioning the venerable GIMP, which is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. It offers a ton of photoshop-style plugins and editing capabilities, but very little in the way of creature comforts or usability. Other lightweight, low-cost options include Polarr and Pixlr.
How to Edit Your Photos Online
In this roundup, we've only included installable computer software, but entry-level photo shooters may be adequately served by online photo-editing options. These are mostly free, and they're often tied to online photo storage and sharing services. Flickr (with its integrated photo editor) and Google Photos are the biggest names here, and both can spiff up your uploaded pictures and do a lot to help you organize them. They even approach the two entry-level installed programs here, but they lack many tools found in the pro and enthusiast products. The latest version of Lightroom CC includes a good deal of photo-editing capabilties in its included website, too. Other notable names in web-based photo editing include BeFunky, Fotor, and PicMonkey.
Image Editing for Enthusiasts and Prosumers
Most of the products in this roundup fall into this category, which includes people who genuinely love working with digital photographs. These are not free applications, and they require a few hundred megabytes of your disk space. Several, such as Lightroom and CyberLink PhotoDirector, are strong when it comes to workflow—importing, organizing, editing, and outputting the photos from a DSLR. Such apps offer nondestructive editing, meaning the original photo files aren't touched. Instead, a database of edits you apply is maintained, and they appear in photos that you export from the application. These apps also offer strong organization tools, including keyword tagging, color-coding, geo-tagging with maps, and in some cases face recognition to organize photos by what people appear in them.
At the back end of workflow is output. Capable software like Lightroom Classic offers powerful printing options such as soft-proofing, which shows you whether the printer you use can produce the colors in your photo or not. (Strangely, the new version of Lightroom CC—non-Classic—offers no printing capability at all.) Lightroom Classic can directly share photos to sites like Flickr and SmugMug. In fact, all really good software at this level offers strong printing and sharing, and some, like ACDSee and Lightroom, offer their own online photo hosting.
The programs at the enthusiast level and the professional level can import and edit raw files from your digital camera. These are files that include every bit of data from the camera's image sensor. Each camera manufacturer uses its own format and file extension for these. For example, Canon DSLRs use CR2 files and Nikon uses NEF. (Raw here simply means what it sounds like, a file with the raw sensor data; it's not an acronym or file extension, so there's no reason to capitalize it.)
Working with raw files provides some big advantages when it comes to correcting (often termed adjusting) photos. Since the photo you see on screen is just one interpretation of what's in the raw file, the software can dig into that data to recover more detail in a bright sky, or it can fully fix an improperly rendered white balance. If you set your camera to shoot with JPGs, you're losing those capabilities.
Enthusiasts want to do more than just import, organize and render their photos: They want to do fun stuff, too! Editors' Choice Adobe Photoshop Elements includes Guided Edits, which make special effects like motion blur or color splash (where only one color shows on an otherwise black-and-white photo) a simple step-by-step process.
Content-aware tools in some of these products let you do things like move objects around while maintaining a consistent background, or remove objects entirely—say you want to remove a couple of strangers from a serene beach scene—and have the app fill in the background. These edits don't involve simple filters like you get in Instagram. Rather, they produce highly customized, one-off images. Another good example is CyberLink PhotoDirector's Multiple Exposure effect, which lets you create an image with ten versions of Johnny jumping that curb on his skateboard, for example.
Most of these products can produce HDR effects and panoramas after you feed them multiple shots, and local edit brushes let you paint adjustments onto only specific areas of an image. Affinity Photo has those features, but its interface isn't intuitive, and it lacks management and lens profile corrections. Capture One, Paintshop Pro, and Lightroom have those and even more precise tools for local selections in recent versions. For example they let you select everything in a photo within a precise color range and refine the selection of difficult content such as a model's hair or trees on the horizon.
Professional Photo Editing Software
At the very top end of image editing is Photoshop, which has no real rival. Its layered editing, drawing, text, and 3D-imaging tools are the industry standard for a reason. Of course, pros need more than this one application, and many use workflow programs like Lightroom, AfterShot Pro, or Photo Mechanic for workflow functions like import and organization. In addition to its workflow prowess, Lightroom offers mobile photo apps so that photographers on the run can get some work done before they even get back to their PC. Those who need tethered shooting (taking pictures in the software from the computer while it's attached to the camera) may want Capture One, which is offers lots of tools for that along with its top-notch raw-file conversion.
Photoshop offers all and more of the image editing capabilities in anything mentioned above, though it doesn't always make producing those effects as simple, and it doesn't offer a nondestructive workflow, as Lightroom and some others do. Of course, some users with less-intensive needs can get all the Photoshop-type features they need from other products in this roundup, such as Corel PaintShop Pro. DxO OpticPro is another tool pros may want in their kit, because of its excellent lens-profile based corrections and unmatched DxO Prime noise reduction.
Photoshop is also where you find Adobe's latest and greatest imaging technology, such as Content-Aware Crop, Camera Shake Reduction, Perspective Warp, and Detail Enhancement. The program has the most tools for professionals in the imaging industry, including Artboards, Design Spaces, and realistic, customizable brushes.
Another advantage of pro-level photo editing software is that you can take advantage of third-party plug-ins such as the excellent Nik Collection by DxO. These can add more effects and adjustments than you find in the base software. They often include tools for film looks, sharpening, and noise reduction.
Photography Editing Apps For Mac
Some users have taken umbrage at Adobe's move to a subscription-only option for Photoshop, but at $9.99 per month, it hardly seems exorbitant for any serious image professional, and it includes a copy of Lightroom, online services like Adobe Stock, and multiple mobile apps. It definitely makes the app more affordable for prosumer users, too, when you consider that a full copy of Photoshop used to cost a cool $999.
Free Photo Editing Tool
If you're an absolute beginner in digital photography, your first step is to make sure you've got good hardware to shoot with, otherwise you're sunk before you start. Consider our roundups of the Best Digital Cameras and the Best Camera phones for equipment that can fit any budget. Once you've got your hardware sorted, make sure to educate yourself with our Quick Photography Tips for Beginners and our Beyond-Basic Photography Tips, too. That done, you'll be ready to shoot great pictures that you can make better with the software featured in this story. Click the links below for to read the full reviews. C++ debugging tool for mac sierra terminal.
Free Photo Editing Software
Best Photo Editing Software in This Roundup:
Adobe Photoshop CC Review
MSRP: $9.99
Pros: Multitude of photo correction and manipulation tools. Slick interface with lots of help. Tools for mobile and web design. Rich set of drawing and typography tools. 3D design capability. Synced Libraries.
Cons: No perpetual-license option. Premium assets aren't cheap. Interface can be overwhelming at times. Lacks support for HEIC.
Bottom Line: Adobe continues to improve the world's leading photo editing software. The 2018 edition adds a new auto-select tool, raw camera profiles, loads of font and drawing capabilities, and support for the Microsoft Surface Dial.
Read ReviewAdobe Lightroom Classic Review
MSRP: $9.99
Pros: Excellent photo management and organization. Camera and lens-based corrections. Brush and gradient adjustments with color and luminance masking. Face detection and tagging. Plug-in support. Connected mobile apps.
Cons: Although improved, import is still slow. Initial raw conversion is slightly more detailed in some competing products.
Bottom Line: Adobe's Photoshop Lightroom remains the gold standard in pro photo workflow software. It's a complete package, with top-notch organization tools, state of-the-art adjustments, and all the output and printing options you'd want.
Read ReviewAdobe Photoshop Elements Review
MSRP: $99.99
Pros: Many powerful image-manipulation tools. Strong face- and geo-tagging capabilities. Excellent output options. Auto-tagging and powerful search options. Helpful guidance for advanced techniques.
Cons: Large disk footprint. No HEIF support on Windows. No chromatic aberration correction or lens geometry profiles. Lacks many social sharing outputs. No local help system.
Bottom Line: Adobe Photoshop Elements, our favorite consumer-level photo editor and organizer, adds AI-powered auto-curation, an open closed eyes tool, and new Guided Edits.
Read ReviewDxO PhotoLab Review
MSRP: $129.00
Pros: Clear interface. Best-in-class noise reduction. Excellent autocorrection based on camera and lens characteristics. Haze remover. Geometry corrections. Powerful local adjustments.
Cons: Few workflow tools. Highest noise-reduction setting can require long waits.
Bottom Line: Though it's still not a complete photo workflow solution, DxO PhotoLab can deliver image results beyond what's possible in other photo software.
Read ReviewCorel PaintShop Pro Review
MSRP: $79.99
Pros: Photoshop-like features at a lower price. Powerful effects and editing tools. Tutorials. Good assortment of vector drawing tools.
Cons: Interface can get cluttered. Ineffective chromatic aberration removal. No face or object recognition. No Mac version.
Bottom Line: Corel continues to add new photo editing possibilities to its PaintShop Pro software, making it a worthy Photoshop alternative at a budget-conscious, one-time price.
Read ReviewCyberLink PhotoDirector Review
MSRP: $99.99
Pros: Friendly yet powerful interface. Effective noise reduction. Cool multiple-exposure and faux HDR effects. Body shaper and other powerful editing tools. Layer support. Cool AI styles. Tethered shooting support.
Cons: Not enough lens-profile corrections. Inadequate chromatic aberration correction. No geotag maps.
Bottom Line: Photo workflow and editing program CyberLink PhotoDirector offers a smooth interface and powerful capabilities. New in this version are multiple-exposure effects, more layer options, and a video-to-photo tool.
Read ReviewPhase One Capture One Pro Review
MSRP: $299.00
Pros: Excellent raw file conversion. Pleasing interface. Fast import. Good photo-adjustment toolset. Keyword tagging tool.
Cons: Some usability quirks. No online-sharing features. No face recognition. No panorama or HDR merging capabilities.
Bottom Line: Phase One Capture One offers pro and prosumer digital photographers excellent detail from raw camera files, and local adjustments including layers, but it trails in organization tools.
Read ReviewACDSee Photo Studio Professional Review
MSRP: $99.99
Pros: Full set of image editing tools. Good performance. Lens-profile-based geometry correction. Face recognition and geotagging. Good skin-improvement tools. Responsive performance. Cloud storage integration.
Cons: Interface not as polished as others. Lens-profile-based image correction tools less effective than the competition's. Weak noise and chromatic aberration tools.
Bottom Line: ACDSee's pro-level tool offers many powerful photo organizing and editing tools, but it falls short of competitors in raw camera file conversion and usability.
Read ReviewExposure Review
MSRP: $149.00
Pros: Pleasing interface. Lots of nifty effects and filters. Fast image transfer. Layers and local adjustments. Good printing options.
Cons: No auto-correction tools. Weak lens-profile corrections. No chromatic aberration correction. No face or geo-tagging.
Bottom Line: Photo-workflow application Exposure is similar to Adobe's Lightroom. It boasts lots of filter effects, but it's missing some key capabilities, such as automatic image correction. https://nainiridec1974.mystrikingly.com/blog/postman-tool-for-mac.
Read ReviewSkylum Luminar Review
MSRP: $69.00
Pros: Pleasing interface. Good automatic photo fixes. Lots of filters. Local adjustments with brush and gradients. Curves. Multiple workspaces and catalogs.
Cons: Some speed and reliability issues on Windows. No Library search. Some standard controls are buried. No face recognition or keyword tagging.
Bottom Line: Skylum Luminar offers effective automatic photo enhancement, a modern interface, and some unique filters and adjustment tools. Its organization capabilities, however, fall short of the competition's.
Read Review
Best Photo Editing Software in This Roundup:
Adobe Photoshop CC Review
MSRP: $9.99Pros: Multitude of photo correction and manipulation tools. Slick interface with lots of help. Tools for mobile and web design. Rich set of drawing and typography tools. 3D design capability. Synced Libraries.
Cons: No perpetual-license option. Premium assets aren't cheap. Interface can be overwhelming at times. Lacks support for HEIC.
Bottom Line: Adobe continues to improve the world's leading photo editing software. The 2018 edition adds a new auto-select tool, raw camera profiles, loads of font and drawing capabilities, and support for the Microsoft Surface Dial.
Read ReviewAdobe Lightroom Classic Review
MSRP: $9.99Pros: Excellent photo management and organization. Camera and lens-based corrections. Brush and gradient adjustments with color and luminance masking. Face detection and tagging. Plug-in support. Connected mobile apps.
Cons: Although improved, import is still slow. Initial raw conversion is slightly more detailed in some competing products.
Bottom Line: Adobe's Photoshop Lightroom remains the gold standard in pro photo workflow software. It's a complete package, with top-notch organization tools, state of-the-art adjustments, and all the output and printing options you'd want.
Read ReviewAdobe Photoshop Elements Review
MSRP: $99.99Pros: Many powerful image-manipulation tools. Strong face- and geo-tagging capabilities. Excellent output options. Auto-tagging and powerful search options. Helpful guidance for advanced techniques.
Cons: Large disk footprint. No HEIF support on Windows. No chromatic aberration correction or lens geometry profiles. Lacks many social sharing outputs. No local help system.
Bottom Line: Adobe Photoshop Elements, our favorite consumer-level photo editor and organizer, adds AI-powered auto-curation, an open closed eyes tool, and new Guided Edits.
Read ReviewDxO PhotoLab Review
MSRP: $129.00Pros: Clear interface. Best-in-class noise reduction. Excellent autocorrection based on camera and lens characteristics. Haze remover. Geometry corrections. Powerful local adjustments.
Cons: Few workflow tools. Highest noise-reduction setting can require long waits.
Bottom Line: Though it's still not a complete photo workflow solution, DxO PhotoLab can deliver image results beyond what's possible in other photo software.
Read ReviewCorel PaintShop Pro Review
MSRP: $79.99Pros: Photoshop-like features at a lower price. Powerful effects and editing tools. Tutorials. Good assortment of vector drawing tools.
Cons: Interface can get cluttered. Ineffective chromatic aberration removal. No face or object recognition. No Mac version.
Bottom Line: Corel continues to add new photo editing possibilities to its PaintShop Pro software, making it a worthy Photoshop alternative at a budget-conscious, one-time price.
Read ReviewCyberLink PhotoDirector Review
MSRP: $99.99Pros: Friendly yet powerful interface. Effective noise reduction. Cool multiple-exposure and faux HDR effects. Body shaper and other powerful editing tools. Layer support. Cool AI styles. Tethered shooting support.
Cons: Not enough lens-profile corrections. Inadequate chromatic aberration correction. No geotag maps.
Bottom Line: Photo workflow and editing program CyberLink PhotoDirector offers a smooth interface and powerful capabilities. New in this version are multiple-exposure effects, more layer options, and a video-to-photo tool.
Read ReviewPhase One Capture One Pro Review
MSRP: $299.00Pros: Excellent raw file conversion. Pleasing interface. Fast import. Good photo-adjustment toolset. Keyword tagging tool.
Cons: Some usability quirks. No online-sharing features. No face recognition. No panorama or HDR merging capabilities.
Bottom Line: Phase One Capture One offers pro and prosumer digital photographers excellent detail from raw camera files, and local adjustments including layers, but it trails in organization tools.
Read ReviewACDSee Photo Studio Professional Review
MSRP: $99.99Pros: Full set of image editing tools. Good performance. Lens-profile-based geometry correction. Face recognition and geotagging. Good skin-improvement tools. Responsive performance. Cloud storage integration.
Cons: Interface not as polished as others. Lens-profile-based image correction tools less effective than the competition's. Weak noise and chromatic aberration tools.
Bottom Line: ACDSee's pro-level tool offers many powerful photo organizing and editing tools, but it falls short of competitors in raw camera file conversion and usability.
Read ReviewExposure Review
MSRP: $149.00Pros: Pleasing interface. Lots of nifty effects and filters. Fast image transfer. Layers and local adjustments. Good printing options.
Cons: No auto-correction tools. Weak lens-profile corrections. No chromatic aberration correction. No face or geo-tagging.
Bottom Line: Photo-workflow application Exposure is similar to Adobe's Lightroom. It boasts lots of filter effects, but it's missing some key capabilities, such as automatic image correction. https://nainiridec1974.mystrikingly.com/blog/postman-tool-for-mac.
Read ReviewSkylum Luminar Review
MSRP: $69.00Pros: Pleasing interface. Good automatic photo fixes. Lots of filters. Local adjustments with brush and gradients. Curves. Multiple workspaces and catalogs.
Cons: Some speed and reliability issues on Windows. No Library search. Some standard controls are buried. No face recognition or keyword tagging.
Bottom Line: Skylum Luminar offers effective automatic photo enhancement, a modern interface, and some unique filters and adjustment tools. Its organization capabilities, however, fall short of the competition's.
Read Review
