Google Photos Celebrates 10 Years: Multiple Exciting Gifts for Users!

Google Photos is celebrating its 10th anniversary, and for this special occasion, the app has planned a delightful gift for its users. Let’s explore what Mountain View’s company has in store.

Google is infamous for suddenly discontinuing many of its services. However, some have stood the test of time and reached significant milestones. A prime example is Google Photos, which celebrated its 10th anniversary on May 28, 2025. It has since become the go-to app for many photography enthusiasts on both Android and iOS platforms. The app boasts a monthly user base of 1.5 billion people worldwide, a testament to its evolution into much more than just a simple gallery.

The Mountain View firm has transformed it into a hub of advanced editing tools, while also enhancing its cloud storage system. To mark the occasion, Google has published a blog post outlining 10 tips for Google Photos users. But the highlight for many will be this announcement: exclusive features from the Pixel 9 are set to be available on other Android smartphones. Additionally, a fresh design for the editor will also be introduced. Let’s see what we can expect.

Google Photos Unveils a Surprise for Its 10th Anniversary

Starting with the new photo editing interface, which you can see in the screenshot below. The icons have been revamped to align with Material 3 Expressive, expected in Android 16. Beyond the visual appeal, the real change happens when you hit Edit. Instead of presenting generic editing suggestions, the AI will now offer recommendations it deems most suitable for the opened photo. To view these, simply select AI Enhancement.

Two Google Photos features previously exclusive to Pixel 9 are making their way to other Android smartphones. First is the Automatic Cropping. Despite its name, it does more than just straighten your photo. Thanks to AI, this feature can generate content based on the photo to extend it, similar to the generative fill function in Photoshop.

Next comes a feature called Reimagine. Again relying on artificial intelligence, this allows for localized edits based on a text query. For example, you might select a grey sky in your photo, a dialog box opens, and you type “blue with a few clouds”. Of course, the quality of the results from these two tools will depend on the complexity of the request and the area being edited. In the example below, you can see in the bottom right that the AI fill has left an empty area on the person’s coat.

The latest addition to look forward to will make sharing your albums on Google Photos easier. Currently, you can send a sharing link by adding the recipient’s email, or generate the link and share it by any means you prefer. To these options, sharing albums via QR Code will be added. This is ideal when you are physically with the people you want to share the photos with.

All that remains is to wait for these new functions to appear in your Google Photos app on Android. The rollout will begin next month (June 2025), though Google has not specified how long the full deployment will take. If you are an iOS user, you’ll have to wait even longer, as the timeline given is a vague “later in the year”.