Google Launches Face Touchup Tools in Photos

Google announced on Monday a new set of touchup tools for its Google Photos image editor, aimed at providing subtle enhancements to faces in photographs. The features, which allow users to refine skin texture, remove blemishes, brighten eyes, whiten teeth, and make other adjustments, began rolling out globally the same day to Android devices running version 9.0 or later with at least 4 gigabytes of RAM.

To access the tools, users open a photo in the Google Photos app, select a detected face, and choose from options including heal, smooth, under eyes, irises, teeth, eyebrows, or lips. Each tool includes an adjustable intensity slider, enabling fine-tuned edits that Google describes as subtle enough to blend naturally with the original image. The company emphasized that these additions help photos "capture how you feel in the moment," positioning the tools as a way to preserve emotional authenticity while addressing minor imperfections.

The rollout follows months of development hints within the app. Code references to face retouching, including terms like acne, blemishes, dark circles, and teeth whitening, first appeared in Google Photos in October. By December, testers had...