Google Photos Gets a Fresh, Intuitive UI Redesign on iPhone

Google is revamping its Photos app with minimal and intuitive UI overhauls that aim to modernise the platform for its users. And this time, it is the Photo View interface is getting a facelift.

Google says that this new redesign will deliver a "simpler, more modern, and more intuitive UI". Starting off with dynamic system theming, the Photo View interface is getting a new light mode alongside the pre-existing dark mode. It can also be set to switch based on the system theme.

Next up is the overall visual and placement overhaul that is now live in Google Photos. This new UI brings the date, time and location to the top of every image, making it visible at a glance. 

At the top right, the 3-dots icon offers a floating menu with five handy options – About, Google Lens, Create, Cast and Delete from device. Users will be able to conveniently learn more about the displayed image, use Google Lens to learn more, create collage, video or cinematic photos, cast it to a supported device, or delete an image from device storage.

Apart from this, at the very bottom, the Photo View UI will have a clean, minimal and clutter-free action menu with four distinctive options – Share, Edit, Add to and Trash. It will let users share the image across platforms, edit the image with granular editing options, add the image to an album, archive folder or to a locked folder, and tap on the Trash option to delete the photo.

Google is also adding pill-shaped badges below the glanceable date, time and location. These will act as identifiers, designating a type to the displayed image. Users will also be able to tap on these badges to change the image category, play/pause live videos, and more. For example, users will be able to know and edit at a glance Live images, any top pick image, a burst shot, and more.

And speaking of burst shots, users will now get a 3-dots icon baked within the preview window at the bottom of burst and stack images to facilitate a slew of actions. Tapping it will trigger a floating menu with the option to keep the current image only, unstack images, remove the displayed image from stack and multi-select images.

With that said, the new features are live on the Google Photos app on iOS currently. Google has confirmed that these new changes will be soon available for its Android users as well.