The Digital camera app obtained a number of the most noticeable design updates in iOS 26, with Apple simplifying the interface to make it simpler to get to numerous controls. Most of what is new focuses on design, however there are a pair different notable adjustments.
Liquid Glass Design
Like all the iOS 26 apps, the Digital camera app has adopted the Liquid Glass look. Buttons are extra rounded and “float” over the background of the app because of a brand new depth impact.
The realm behind the digicam shutter and management buttons is a contact extra see-through than earlier than, so you may see the areas exterior of your picture extra clearly. There’s additionally no bar behind the toggles to vary focal size, so the interface appears a bit cleaner.
Two-Tab Structure
The navigation bar on the backside of the Digital camera app has been overhauled in iOS 26. Somewhat than the choice to swipe between all the picture and video modes, there are actually simply two major choices that you just see: Picture and Video.
Whereas it is solely the Picture and Video buttons which are seen, you may really nonetheless swipe in the identical option to get to the opposite choices like Portrait, Panorama, Slo-Mo, Cinematic, and extra.
For multi-lens cameras, the small buttons to vary focal size are nonetheless in the identical place, and the buttons to view the picture you simply snapped or change to the entrance digicam have not modified location. The button to view photographs is now spherical as an alternative of sq., in step with the Liquid Glass replace, and Apple has shifted the controls down on the show.
The Picture and Video buttons are beneath the shutter button, once they was once above. The shutter button itself now not has a vivid white ring round it, with Apple as an alternative choosing a extra delicate Liquid Glass ring. Bezel dimension for the highest and backside bars hasn’t modified.
A number of the controls that was once situated on the prime of the Digital camera app are actually tucked inside come out menus. When you choose a mode like Picture, you may then faucet on the Picture button to get extra choices.
The menu has a Liquid Glass design and it provides giant buttons for accessing Flash, Reside Picture settings, Timer, Publicity, Kinds, Facet, and Night time Mode. Tapping one offers you additional choices for that setting. So when you faucet Publicity, you may get a slider the place you may shortly modify the publicity setting earlier than you are taking a photograph.
In Video mode, you may faucet to entry Flash, Publicity, and Motion. Many of the different modes even have at the very least one choice that is accessed by this new menu. These menu choices are additionally accessible by tapping on the menu icon on the prime proper of the show.
There are nonetheless some fast entry buttons on the prime of the Photographs app, so you may swap to RAW mode, faucet into Kinds, or modify flash and Night time Mode settings with out having to open the menu. Context-specific settings just like the Macro mode toggle additionally nonetheless pop up in the identical manner as earlier than when relevant.
There are toggles to see the Flash, Reside Picture and Motion Mode indicators within the Digital camera part of the Settings app.
Distant AirPods Shutter
The AirPods Professional 2 and AirPods 4 can be utilized as a digicam shutter in iOS 26, so you may take a photograph by urgent on the stem of the AirPods. To get this to work, join your AirPods to your iPhone, open the Digital camera app, after which press and maintain on the AirPods stem.
You possibly can take a photograph utilizing this methodology, or proceed to carry to begin a video. Whenever you’re completed recording, press and maintain once more to cease the video.
Utilizing this function requires iOS 26 and the brand new AirPods firmware that accompanies iOS 26. Utilizing the AirPods as a distant shutter button works with the Digital camera app and with third-party picture apps.
Cleansing Warning
In case your digicam lens is soiled, your iPhone can detect that it must be cleaned and can ship you a notification letting you already know it’s best to clear it.
Developer APIs
Builders have entry to a brand new Cinematic mode API in iOS 26 that enables third-party apps to seize Cinematic mode video, similar to the built-in Digital camera app.
Cinematic mode helps recording video with a shallow depth of subject and computerized focus adjustments between topics. Apple makes use of rack focus to shortly swap the main target from one topic to a different, for a movie-like recording expertise.
Apple can be offering builders with an Audio Combine API for adjusting sound after a video is captured. Third-party video recording apps can provide the identical Audio Combine controls which are accessible within the Digital camera app. Choices embrace In-Body for decreasing sounds and voices from sources exterior of the body, Studio for decreasing background sounds and reverb, and Cinematic for placing voices right into a front-facing observe whereas leaving environmental noises in encompass, just like film audio.
Mac Accessibility
With macOS 26 and iOS 26, your Mac can hook up with your iPhone to make use of your iPhone’s Digital camera app as a magnifying glass. A Magnifier on Mac function makes use of the iPhone’s zoom capabilities, with the iPhone’s video feed exhibiting up on a linked Mac by Continuity Digital camera.
Apple confirmed a scholar with imaginative and prescient points utilizing an iPhone to zoom in on a blackboard in a school class, with the feed coming by to her Mac so she might view what was happening whereas additionally taking notes.
Learn Extra
We’ve a full iOS 26 roundup that covers all the new options which are accessible within the replace.
