This hidden setting turned my iPhone 16 Profe...

Certain, I would’ve been emotionally hooked up to my iPhone 12 Pro (although it was hanging on by a thread), however I used to be by no means so blissful to see the digicam go. Once I first received it again in 2020, like all new telephones, I felt like I had the most recent, baddest digicam on the block. I do not know if it was age, being left within the solar too lengthy (a couple of occasions) or the conspiracy that Apple deliberately degrades older iPhone fashions, however now in 2025, the digicam high quality had change into borderline embarrassing.

I am not kidding — my buddies would seize my telephone to take an image and instantly ask what was flawed with it. However then different occasions, so long as the lighting was completely good, it will gaslight me into considering it was the most effective digicam round once more. I used to be finished questioning whether or not or not a photograph would prove a couple of weeks in the past once I lastly upgraded to an iPhone 16 Pro.

Now that I have been taking pictures my pictures with the for the final two weeks, here is what I discovered stark (and never so insane) concerning the leap up 4 generations.

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I traded in my iPhone 12 Professional and walked right into a tech identification disaster.

The starkest distinction

Lighting did not must be on its greatest habits

First, let’s discuss specs. The iPhone 12 Professional has a 12-megapixel digicam whereas the 16 Professional has a 48-megapixel digicam — that is actually 4 occasions the megapixels 4 generations later. I’ve already seen the distinction once I’m zooming in or cropping my images from my new digicam, and it brings me nice pleasure as a social media supervisor who’s all the time reducing, cropping, and pasting all whereas my fingers are crossed on the standard facet of issues.

Now, let’s transfer to aperture, which is how a lot gentle a lens permits right into a digicam. The 12 Professional has ƒ/1.6 aperture on its principal digicam whereas the 16 Professional has ƒ/1.78. On the floor, aperture going up is not all the time the most effective factor — it does let in additional gentle. Nonetheless, that was the primary challenge I used to be working into with my dusty 12 Professional — all the things was simply means too darkish. Mix that barely “worse” aperture on the 16 Professional with 4 occasions the megapixels and the opposite improved processing powers it possesses? I will take the 16 Professional profitable the specs warfare every single day of the week.

Pay attention, I used to be anticipating to be blown away by the iPhone 16 Professional’s digicam high quality in comparison with the dinosaur I used to be taking photos on the 5 years prior. However after tooling round for a short time, I noticed that even after 4 generations, Apple did such a very good job with the iPhone 12 Professional’s lenses that each one the upgrades that got here after have been really simply fine-tuning tweaks to optimize an already good digicam. I wasn’t as overwhelmed with image high quality as I believed I’d be.

Granted, my Snapchats have been noticeably increased high quality — I even had a pal ask me what I had finished otherwise within the final week. I am not saying I seemed higher. Quite the opposite, you could possibly truly see each single pore on my face (which I did not love, clearly). However what I did discover proper off the bat was that beneath any lighting, good or pitch black, my new iPhone 16 Professional received a very good shot in it. My iPhone 12 Professional would utterly freak out in any sort of lighting — and I could not even take into consideration taking a selfie exterior for the sake of sunshine stripes that utterly dominated any facial options, not to mention posting any photos I took to my Instagram.

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Spare {hardware}, good sir?

I suppose my 12 Professional gave me somewhat picture PTSD, as a result of I discovered myself hesitating to take photos I knew it could not take even once I already upgraded to the 16 Professional. Nonetheless, I overcame that feature-fear and was delighted to seek out that I had image freedom as soon as extra with the brand new telephone. Lighting certain helps any image, however it did not make or break my image high quality within the slightest.

New pictures options

Hiya Photographic Types

Bear in mind how Portrait Mode took the world by storm again in 2016? Effectively, I used to be not impressed. I thought-about myself a Lightroom Cellular skilled on the ripe age of 17, and I most well-liked to edit my photos after I took them — not throughout — thanks very a lot. Through the years, increasingly more modes got here out, however I wasn’t one to leap on that bandwagon. It was all the time the worst once I would ask a stranger to take an image on my telephone out in public solely to undergo my digicam later and see that they selected to make use of Portrait Mode. They virtually all the time did it to be thoughtful, so I’d scream into the theoretical pillow once I received residence so they would not assume I used to be ungrateful.

However a brand new characteristic has lastly had the gall to strike my fancy this time: Photographic Types. Granted, it helps to work at a tech website — Patrick O’Rourke, Pocket-lint’s Editor-in-Chief, put me onto this specific setting. Principally, it makes use of scene understanding to regulate specific colours in numerous components of your images. Individuals usually use it to personalize how they need their pores and skin tones to look right down to the pixel. I used to be intrigued by how nuanced it may get.

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Get that “Excessive Effectivity” out of my face.

To start out, it’s a must to select 4 of your favourite photos — the catch is that they needed to be taken on the brand new telephone. After you select them, they’re going to act as mediums to match completely different Types. You possibly can choose between:

• Normal
• Amber
• Gold
• Rose Gold
• Impartial
• Cool Rose

Since I’ve hotter undertones, the latter three made me look completely insane and straight out of a 2014 Tumblr selfie captioned: Listening to Sweater Climate #theneighbourhood. So, I opted for Amber, after which received to taking part in round with the depth of the tone and shade. Like all Apple options, it was extremely intuitive — so long as you have used any sort of fundamental picture editor ever in your life.

You possibly can return and edit this setting any time, however from there on out, the photographs you’re taking will mechanically be edited in that fashion. I prefer it as a result of it is extremely refined — not in your face just like the notorious Portrait Mode. Now, my photos are simply ever-so-slightly hotter in the way in which I’d normally edit them anyway.

Digicam Management

I actually could not care much less about it

Sure, we all know — there is a enjoyable new button on the iPhone 16 fashions that successfully flip your iPhone right into a digicam. Nonetheless, I fairly actually have not used it since I arrange the telephone, thought, “Oh yeah, there’s this new factor,” tried it as soon as, and mentioned out loud, “I’m by no means going to make use of this factor.”

Nonetheless, I do must acknowledge it, because it’s the most recent piece of {hardware} on the iPhone for the reason that Motion Button, and I’m neck-deep into the pictures division right here. In trying to find a very good use for the brand new button (and to throw Apple a bone right here), I tweaked a fast setting to create an precise use for Digicam Management: clicking it as I choose up my locked iPhone to right away open the digicam app with out having to unlock or get up the display screen within the first place.

The iPhone 16 Professional’s default is to require the display screen to be on to launch digicam management. To vary this:

1. Open Settings.
2. Choose Digicam Management.
3. Scroll to the underside and toggle off “Require Display On.”

And there you may have it — now you possibly can deal with your iPhone just like the point-and-shoot Apple desires you to. Tremendous-computer capabilities tagged on, after all.