iOS 16: How to instantly lift the subject from any image
When iOS 16 launches this fall, everyone will be talking about their custom lock screen. But the real star of the update may be something used (and abused) by millions of people on social media and posts every day – a built-in ability to simply take the topic off almost each photo.
I don’t mean just you own photos in your own library. Rather, this is a comprehensive system-wide feature that can also extract the subject from images on the web in Safari and images in Files. It’s not perfect, with the occasional blurry edges or strange selections, but it can save a huge amount of time and be a lot of fun. This is how it works.
- Time to complete: 1 minute
Tools needed: iPhone with A12 Bionic and iOS 16 Required materials: no Cost: 0
In Photos, long press a subject and select Copy
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In your Photos app, select an image and long-press on the subject. It works best when the subject is clearly defined from the background. The image will have a white outline and when you release your finger you will see To copy and Part… options. Select To copy to copy to clipboard, or Part… to open the share sheet to share only the topic.
On the web, long press an image and choose Copy subject
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On a website, long press an image and release. You will see a pop-up menu. Here, Part, To copyand Save to photos refers to the whole image. So choose Copy topic to select only the subject of the image.
Paste the image into a message (or anywhere else!)
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Once you’ve copied the topic, you can paste it anywhere you normally can paste stuff from your clipboard. Tap in Messages and select Paste, or in Files to save it as a .PNG file with a transparent background. It even works with Handoff between your iPhone and Mac.
How it works in macOS Ventura
As you’d expect, this also works on your iPad running iPadOS 16. But it’s built into macOS Ventura too! In Safari or Photos, right-click an image (or tap the touchpad with two fingers) and choose “Copy Subject” to copy it to your clipboard. If you’re using another application (or browser), save the image first, then in Finder use QuickLook (spacebar) to open the image, then right-click and choose Copy Subject.
You can then paste that image into any application that accepts images from your clipboard, such as Messages, Mail, or Notes.
It even works on paused videos!
When you’re playing a video in the Photos app, you can pause it and select the subject as if it were a still image. However, this doesn’t really work with every video on the web, especially if it uses its own video player. The solution to this is to take a screenshot and then copy the subject from that image. It’s an extra step or two, but it’s a much more reliable method.