How to take better photos on any smartphone

Go beyond pointing and shooting with your phone. Joe Eitzen/Unsplash We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. Learn more › Sign Up For Goods 🛍️ Product news, reviews, and must-have deals. By signing up, you confirm you are 16+, will receive newsletters and promotional content and agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge the data practices in our Privacy Policy. You may unsubscribe at any time. Our phones get better camera hardware and image-processing software with each passing year, but most of the time when we’re snapping photos we’re not doing anything other than pointing and shooting—and then moving on. And clearly speed and convenience are benefits. Today’s best phones let you capture great images without worrying too much about lighting, framing, white balance, or any of the other considerations a professional photographer would think about. At the same time, it’s worth knowing the features and tools on your phone that can elevate your pictures to the next level—often with just a few seconds of extra work. They can also help you capture images you might not have otherwise. With that in mind, here are the best tools in the default camera apps on the flagship Pixel, Galaxy, and iPhone models on the market at the moment. You might find a trick or feature that you come to rely on a lot in the future to make your photos stand out from the crowd. These tips apply to the latest software at the time of writing: Android 17 (Pixel), One UI 8.5 (Galaxy), and iOS 27 (iPhone). You might find the camera app on your handset varies in some details if you’re using an older software version or an older phone model. Google Pixel Camera app tips The Pixel Camera interface. David Nield Underneath the shutter button on the Pixel Camera app, you have a variety of modes to pick from: Just swipe left or right to see the full selection. One of the most useful is Night Sight, which captures and combines multiple frames to boost low-light photos (and can even be used for astrophotography); there’s also Portrait, which identifies the main subject of a photo and lets you apply a custom depth blur around it. Whichever mode you’re using, you can tap the controls button (the sliders icon, lower right) to bring up a variety of adjustment tools including Shadows, Exposure, and White Balance. Any changes you make here are previewed in the capture window above, before you take the shot, so you can see the effect they’ll have. There’s also Focus, which lets you tap on something in the frame to lock the focus on that object or person—and keep the focus there, even while you move the camera. ISO gives you manual control over how much light gets captured in the shot (useful for bespoke low-light shots), while Shutter speed lets you go from motion freezes (faster speeds) to motion blurs and light trails (slower speeds). Tap the settings button (the cog icon, lower left) to customize the photo-taking process further. From here you can enable Top Shot, a Pixel trick where a short video is taken and AI picks the best still frame based on composition and lighting (though you are able to choose a different frame, if you prefer). There’s also Motion photo, which captures a still image and a few seconds of video for more immersive memories (and to create GIFs). From the settings screen, tap the three dots (top right) to access more options. The next screen lets you turn on the Grid type to frame subjects more precisely, as well as the Framing Hints feature, which uses on-screen hints to make sure the focus and level of your image are the best they can be before you tap the shutter button. Ultra HDR can be enabled here, too, for shots that have brighter colors and more detail in darker areas than those in standard mode. Samsung Galaxy Camera app tips The Galaxy Camera interface. David Nield If you’re using a Samsung Galaxy phone to take photos, when you open up the Camera app you’ll see several modes along the bottom of the screen that you can swipe between. Immediately to the left of the Photo option is Portrait, which brings the main subject of your image into focus and lets you apply a custom blur level to the background (tap the icon on the left showing one circle inside another to set the blur). Swipe to the More option, and you’ll find a host of shooting modes you may not have been aware of, including Panorama and Slow Motion. One of the most interesting ones here is Food, which is worth trying whenever you’re photographing meals and dishes in front of you: Samsung says it will “automatically adjust the coloring to make your dishes look even more delicious”. Tap the Pro option on this screen and a host of extra options appear for you. You can adjust the white balance, tint, shutter speed (how long the shutter stays open), ISO (the camera’s light sensitivity), and exposure—just adjust the dials as needed. There’s also AF, or auto focus, which picks out a photo’s subject and keeps it in focus (you can also switch to manual focus mode to tap on a focus point yourself). In this mode, you can also tap the dual-circle icon (very top right) to enable the exposure monitor—a way to assess light levels on the shutter screen and make sure your shot is correctly exposed. Tap the framed dot icon (to the left of the exposure monitor icon) to get the exposure meter options, which actually adjust exposure based on the scene. In any photo mode, tap the four dots (on the right), then the cog icon to access general camera settings. From the next screen, you’re able to set up Instagram-style filters for your pictures, and enable on-screen guidance for getting the best photos (the Shot suggestions toggle switch). By turning on the Composition guide option, you can get a grid overlay on the camera screen to help with framing your shots. Apple iPhone Camera app tips The iPhone Camera interface. David Nield Apple’s default Camera app on the iPhone comes with a useful selection of tools and tweaks you can explore as well. To start with, try swiping left and right to move between the various photo and video modes available to you—these include Portrait, which automatically puts the main subject of your photo in focus while gently blurring the background (use the dial that appears above the shutter button to choose your lighting and blur effect). To bring up more advanced controls over your snaps when in Photo mode, tap the icon to the right of the shutter button with six dots inside it. This gives you access to controls on screen that include Exposure (affecting lightness and darkness), and Depth (affecting the depth of field, enabling you to create some different background blur effects). This pop-up menu also has two similar options. The first is Styles, which lets you swipe through processing modes like Warm, Cool, and Vibrant; these affect the photo as it’s taken and impact different parts of the image in different ways. Secondly, there is Filters, with options including Dramatic, Noir, and Vivid. These affect the entire image, like an overlay, and can be changed or removed later. Another trick worth knowing about: You can tap anywhere on the screen when capturing a photo to set the focus point. This stays in place as you move the camera, and can make for some interesting effects. To keep the lock in place for several photos in succession, press and hold on the screen at the point where you want the focus fixed. You’ll find more options by heading to Settings in iOS and choosing Camera. From here, you’re able to turn on the Grid and Level, which give you more guidance over framing photos and keeping them level with the horizon. You can also configure numerous camera defaults, including the style mode and lens correction adjustments. Oh, and consider removing identifiable location information before posting those photos online. 2026 Popular Science Home of the Future Awards 39 products that will improve your everyday life.