After many complaints about redesigning the Photos app on iOS 18, Apple is tweaking the look and feel of the app with a new OS release. It is now branded as iOS 26.
The change was briefly mentioned on Monday in a keynote address at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC 25). Apple said it is reverting its tabbed interface to the photos, but it doesn't look the same as before.
“We never missed using tabs in the Photos app,” said Craig Federighi, Apple's Senior Vice President of Software Engineering. This said it's just as close as Apple admits it made a mistake in an overhaul of its app last year. “The photos feature separate tabs for the library and collection,” he added as he demoed the update.
In the collection, you can find your favorites, albums and search across your library.
Image credit: Apple
On the other hand, the Library tab allows you to easily scroll through recent photos. This is a user interface that many people clearly like.
The photo changes in iOS 18 have centralized all the ways in which you can interact and organize your photos on one page, leading to several backlashes. Some developers have provided third-party photography apps that have leveraged backlash to bring back old user interfaces for a fee.
Additionally, with iOS 26 update, the Photos app can convert 2D photos to 3D Spatial Photos. This feature is located on the iPhone's updated lock screen and is inspired by Apple's Vision Pro Spatial Computing headset.
Related to photos, the iPhone and iPad camera apps have been updated to make it easy to find many features. This app now shows you the two most used capture modes on the main screen: photos and videos. To view additional modes, you can swipe your finger left or right. Here you can switch to portrait mode, movie mode, etc. Swipe up from the bottom of the screen to access other settings, such as flash, timer, aperture, and more.
You can also change the format by tapping. This can help you toggle between HD and 4K resolutions and adjust the frame rate of your video.