iOS 16: How to Control When iPhone Camera Shots Are Saved to Your iCloud Shared Photo Library - MacRumors
Skip to Content

iOS 16: How to Control When iPhone Camera Shots Are Saved to Your iCloud Shared Photo Library

by

In iOS 16, it's possible to create a shared iCloud Photo Library that allows up to five other friends with Apple products to contribute photos to.

iOS 16 Photos and Camera Guide Feature
This means if you are all at the same event, you can have your iPhone camera automatically upload new shots to the same shared library for you to enjoy and look back on together.

In the Camera app, you can tap a new icon that looks like two people to swap between automatic uploading to the shared library and your personal library. Using Bluetooth, your iPhone can even detect when you're in the same location as other participants in the library and set the Camera app to automatically add photos and videos to the shared library.

camera
If you don't like the Sharing from Camera app option for whatever reason, you can manually disable it, and if you change your mind, you can re-enable it anytime, so long as you still have a Shared ‌iCloud Photo Library‌ active. The following steps show you how it's done on an iPhone running iOS 16.

  1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone.
  2. Scroll down and tap Photos.
  3. Under "Library," tap Shared Library.
  4. Tap Sharing From Camera.
  5. Toggle the switch on or off next to Sharing from Camera.

settings

If you choose to enable Sharing from Camera, you can use the same menu of options to set the Camera to Share Automatically or Share Manually, with the latter option allowing you to make use of the new upload button in the Camera app, as outlined above.

Popular Stories

sweeping AI driven upgrades feature

First Look at AI Camera and Photos Features in iOS 27 Revealed

Thursday May 28, 2026 6:32 am PDT by
Apple is planning sweeping AI-driven upgrades to its Camera and Photos apps in iOS 27, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reports. Image via Bloomberg. The report offers a first look at the appearance of several major iOS 27 features that Apple plans to announce at its Worldwide Developers Conference on June 8. The images are based on information viewed by Bloomberg and people said to be familiar with ...
apple intelligence photos tools

Apple to Bring AI Reframing and Editing Tools to Photos App

Monday June 8, 2026 11:16 am PDT by
Apple today announced new AI-powered photo editing tools coming to the Photos app as part of Apple Intelligence, including an upgraded Clean Up tool, a new Extend tool, and a new Spatial Reframing feature. Spatial Reframing allows users to reposition the virtual camera angle of a photo after it has already been taken. By touching and dragging, users can adjust the framing and perspective of...
iOS 26 Glass Photos Feature

Apple Photos Finally Gets a Slideshow Maker

Monday June 8, 2026 5:04 pm PDT by
Apple today announced new slideshow features coming to the Photos app, allowing users to play any set of photos and videos as a slideshow. There are options to set the slide duration, transition style, and music. iOS 27 also lets users save any slideshow directly as a video to their Photos library for easy playback later. Additional new features include the ability to save individual...