Snapseed Reviews

Don’t be fooled by the positive reviews, they are outdated. For years this app was my go to mobile editing app. It was the first app to support raw photos and generally just had a good selection of tools. A few years ago it was purchased by Google along with the rest of Nik software and I’m pretty sure they intentionally sabotaged it. Snapseed is absolute garbage now! If you’re using it to edit your photos then you should know, even if they look alright to your eyes on your 2 inch screen, they are not. Snapseed is destroying your images and you’ll never bring them back. It will muddy up all the detail in saturated areas, totally blow any highlights and bring noise in the shadows. It hasn’t been updated in years so forget using raw images from any newer cameras. It just creates a low res JPEG preview instead but gives no warning of that. Anything you bring into Snapseed should be thrown out afterwards so you don’t ever mistake it for a decent file.

It’s really sad to see what Google did here and I don’t know why they didn’t just take it off the market if that’s what they wanted. At this point it’s doing a disservice to anybody who wants once relied on it or thought it was still a contender in the Mobile photo editing world.

Google obviously does some great things but they also do some very terrible things to their competition. Snapseed and the people who depended on it fell victim to that.

I love Snapseed ! Before I got Snapseed I had so many pictures I had taken that were blurry and I couldn’t fix. I had pictures where I just couldn’t find a good filter with the normal ones like vivid or noir. Like the other day I took a pic with my friend and it was so blurry but the editing tools on my phone weren’t enough to make me love my pic. Then I found that this app was and an app that let people fix their photos and make them so much better than they were before. Then when I got it I was so relieved that I didn’t have to stick with the boring filters already on my phone that I had used so much that I got tired of the same ones. Also when I wanted to post a picture I did but I never liked the filter very much. The only reason I would post it is because I had no other choice because I didn’t have any other options. I really just started using Snapseed and I love it!!!!

I’m changing my rating after discovering something and remembering something else since writing my former review. If my new findings prove solid I will change it again to four stars, because I do love Snapseed and hope it is as strong as it once was, but I wanna make sure it’s running smoothly. Here’s my findings:
For a while my app was freezing and then I couldn’t upload photos to it at all. I just went to check if restrictions were on and they were, so I changed the setting and now I can upload photos and edit them again. I would have figured this much longer ago had there been a restricted access notification when I tried to hit the open button, but since there was not and since Id been having having other issues with Snapseed , I assumed it had just failed. Another problem I was having involved saving images. For years my saved this app images would show up in my main photo collection, and then one day- I now figure it was after an update- I wasn’t finding them in my main photos, so I would instead use the share option and text them to myself and then save them to my photos; I did this for years not realizing until just now that my this app photos had switched storage locations, now ending up in a separate (hard to reach at the bottom of all my other photo folders) this app folder.

This is one of a very select number of apps that appear on my coveted front page. Its ability to smartly select areas for selective retouching is uncannily accurate; its Structure feature beats anything Photoshop can do; and its Ambience tool provides a wonderful combination of brightness, shadow opening, warmth, and even incredible highlight protection all at once. On top of that are regularly-introduced enhancements like the Curves tool, and the incredible White Balance tool which allows you to see your eyedropper effect in real time as you drag it around your image – a huge advantage I have not seen in any other mobile app or even desktop program. On top of all of this, there are other miraculous effects that seem to be added every other week that are too numerous to delineate here but are absolutely worth exploring. My only two wishes are that 1) a clone tool be added; and 2) there were even more options in the Selective and Brush Tools. Still, I recommend Snapseed without reservation.

I must start by saying that I love this app. I have used it for several months taking inventory photos for my business and it has worked great for me, until it didn’t. I’m not sure what happened, if it update messed with the settings, or what. When I use the text filter it used to work great, now when I use it the words are so tiny that they are barely visible. I have googled everything I can to try to find a fix to this as well as searching within the settings of Snapseed to see if I can change the text size, but with the exception of making the bubble that I’m putting the text in extremely large, I can find no other fix.

Also, I have edited hundreds of photos with this app only to wake up one day and ALL of my photos are back to their unedited state. Thankfully I have most of them uploaded to my computer or I would have had to redo them all. Very disappointing.

I’m hoping any future updates to Snapseed will fix this and the text functionality because until that happens Snapseed is essentially useless to me and I love Snapseed.

I used to love this app, but now it keeps exporting with reduced quality, despite my having double checked the settings. It is exporting 12+ megapixel images as 3.1 megapixel. So I have to use the roundabout way to save to Files instead, from the share menu.

I cannot easily open the images I want, since it is a mess trying to open images from this app, without a proper file picker. All the images on my iPad show up together in the terrible tile view. I have marked my favorites in Google Photos, but for some reason, I can't share directly to this app. So I have to download them first. Then if I try to start from Files to find the photo, when I use the share menu and select this app, this app says "Error, Could not load image". I've double checked my settings and this app has access to all photos.

Sometimes the image will load as read only, and then this app doesn't give me the option to Save, only to export, which is broken as I wrote. Between the broken export and the difficulty getting images from Google Photos to open in this app, I can't get anything done.

When I first discovered this app, I was teaching a smart phone photography class and didn’t know how I was going to be able to help the non-Apple students. Snapseed saved the day. I have relied on it for several years now. My 10,000-word class presentation Is filled with all kinds of this app Screenshots. Students seem to like it a lot. Imagine my dismay when, a couple of weeks ago, the screen turns black whenever I try to access a photo from either my or photos or favorite is filled with all kinds of this app Screenshots. Students seem to like it a lot. Imagine my dismay when, a couple of weeks ago, the screen turns black whenever I tap a photo from either my All Photos or Favorites app album! I can still swipe through the filmstrip if I need to open a photo for editing, but that’s so impractical for 9K images on my iPhone X iOS 12.0.1. During class, I also project live-screen demos from my phone (using an HDMI-to-lightning connector). The only place I’ve found this problem discussed is on Reddit. No one has a solution yet. Please, Google: help!

I have been using this app for MANY years; it is the longest-reigning photo editing app in my iLife. Over the years I have tried so many photo apps that seemed promising from their description, but wound up not delivering the goods. The lone survivor of many cullings of my photo apps herd, this app is tried and true!

The fact that I am able to edit a photo and then Save the new edited version OVER the original version (by Allowing Snapseed to ‘Modify’) is the reason why I fell in love with the this app app.
I am able to write a note or add a label on a photo and then save it without creating a new needless copy and, most importantly, without moving the photo from its original spot in my timeline. This allows my edited photos to remain alongside any untouched photos, in their originally captured order. This simple yet invaluable feature is what makes this app a standout for me!

I do wish we could open a chosen photo in this app directly from the Photos app (either via (a) the ‘Edit’ button ‘...’ Activities, or (b) the ‘Share’ button Activities).

And honestly, if you were to add a ‘TOOL’ that allows us to draw (and then move/resize/reshape/rotate) lines, arrows and maybe even squares (shapes), you would become the HOLY GRAIL of photo editing apps! I would [figuratively] shout praises of your name from the mountaintops!!!

I am always excited and never disappointed when you release an update!
Keep up the AMAZING work!!!

Snapseed is so great! I don’t have to pay a subscription like I have to for Lightroom and I am able to edit raw photos! The only downfall is that it has become very laggy, when after I edit a photo from the raw adjustments so I can move on to other adjustments, it becomes stuck in the loading/processing part and then crashes more often now. And whenever I work on photos that involve portraits, using the portrait and healing features, it looks fine within Snapseed . But when I export them to my camera roll, it seems like there is an exporting issue and the portraits look really bad and it looks like the blemishes that’s I took away with the healing app actually get heighten and look even worst. Same for when I use the portrait feature as well. So there is an exporting issue and loading issue with raw files. Other than that, it’s a great app for on the go, run and gun type of style when I don’t want too or can pull out my laptop. I hope these issues get fixed in a future update.

As a professional artist and photographer I'm always on the lookout for apps and gear to enhance prints of my works, and the this app App has been *IT* for me for the last 5 Years.

Suggestions:

1). I'd love access to my digital files on iPad instead of having to select and deselect them in batches, having to remove those accessed last before being able to use Snapseed on the go.

2). I would like a feature included so that I might be able to draw on files to touch them up, where the pen or brush tip can be solid to transparent, where the tips are adjustable in thickness, and the gamut of colors and shades are available for use.
This is something found in most basic photo apps so I don't have to switch between Apps, transfer files back and forth especially when I'm on a tight schedule.

Footnotes:

I like my fellow artists, photographers, are always in need of a more broad range of editing tools within an App.

We want Apps that are free to inexpensive but not cheap in options and range of uses when possible, from companys that makes multiple apps we can use in the entertainment and art industry. This way we can support the company by marketing their Apps to fellow artists, photographers, authors, actors, singers, other industry colleagues, as well as our Fans and Followers.

📸 Jewell 🎨

I will change this review once this is corrected... I use Snapseed all the time on my iPad Pro. Normally I love it however just in the last couple days it is not working properly. After I do some minimal touching up of my photos I push the button to upload the edited photo to my photos. It will start going through the motions of uploading the edited photo but then now it starts spinning in a blue circle like it’s thinking but it gets stuck. While it is doing this I can not do anything, get it to stop, upload a new pic, etc. I have tried getting in & out of Snapseed many times & have also deleted then reloaded Snapseed hoping this would fix any minor glitches. Sadly nothing has worked.. I really do not want to have to download another app.. I use your app all of the time & really would like to continue using it!! Please fix this & advise where do I go to get this fixed?? There is nothing wrong w/my iPad Pro & this has nothing to do w/me trying to do too many edits at once.. Doesn’t matter what I do. Your app will not allow me to upload anything.. HELP!!

Have been using this for a while now and so far it has been great. The presets have been very useful and really helps bring any pictures to life. Then there are several tools for fine tuning the image if a preset alone isn’t enough.

One thing I really wish was possible in Snapseed , was allowing more selective lens blur. The lens blur creates a cool effect of having an optical focus, but the selection is limited to circle/ellipse shapes. This does not allow the focus to be put on the specific object, which throws off the effect of depth on the picture. It would be awesome to use the brush feature to select an exact area to apply the lens blur to. This would give a more accurate effect of focusing the image on one particular thing, while keeping the entire background out of focus.

I’ve been using this app as my go-to app for years now. It’s the first in a chain of editing apps if I’m feeling creative, and often the last as well. Their photo tools alone offer more than many editing apps, but the Portrait, Head Pose, and Looks features are essential for photos on the go. I always start with Healing, usually followed by a hint of Glamour Glow, and even Noir if I’m in that sort of mood (which is often; LOVE the Noir). Also, among all the editing apps that I own and have tried, their Vignette feature is my favorite by far, which seems a minor thing, but really isn’t.

Honestly there are far too many adjustable features and filters to go into in this space, just from a photo editing perspective; I’ve barely mentioned the artistic applications, which seem endless. I will never not use Snapseed.

Dig it and dig in.

Taking photos is one of my favorite hobbies. Editing photos, well...it’s just not. While helping my sister start her own business, we needed product photos. I snapped some off my phone that looked nice, but they needed an extra boost through editing. No other photo editing apps I was previously using were doing it for me. So, I went looking. Found this one and instantly fell in love! I send all my photos through Snapseed before posting now.

Super simple to use. I love the swiping feature to go between settings and to adjust settings. It makes the whole process seamless and effective. Only thing I wish I could do, and it’s entirely possible I’m just not seeing it because I’m still learning new things on Snapseed everyday, is to edit specific colors in the photo. Otherwise, Snapseed is hands down the absolute best!

This application is great. It has so many features and so much you can use to edit. Literally the only problem is that it does not save your edited photos properly.
You’ll edit it to perfection, save a copy, and when you go into your photos to look at it—BAM— there are darkened, yellowed corners out of nowhere. All the editing you did was pointless.
Even if you go into Snapseed again, use the Selective tool to correct it, and save, the copy will STILL not save to look how it looked in Snapseed . It will somehow transform when you save it, and it will look awful. It will look unlike anything how it looked in Snapseed .
This is infuriating. It makes using Snapseed pointless. Why would I spend so much time editing a photo to look perfect only to have it save looking like someone went in a screwed it all up?
I’m opening Snapseed , changing NOTHING about a image, saving it, and even those unedited images come out looking like someone spilt coffee on the corners of it. HOW?
As an artist who relies on apps like this to help me post great looking work, I am beyond disappointed. If a photo looks great, it should still look great AFTER you save it. It should look IDENTICAL to how it looked in Snapseed . It doesn’t make any sense why it would suddenly change between saving it and looking at it in your phone’s photo album.
I don’t know what kind of bug butchers photos that bad only after they’ve been saved but boy did I waste my time trying to get it to look normal. It’s impossible.

Using Snapseed for a photography class for editing and creating a color splash effect worked great and was a huge (and free) lifesaver until recently where I get halfway through editing a photo and the brush tool becomes unresponsive, making it impossible to finish my work I already spent a bunch of my time on. If I try and save what I have, the entire app becomes unresponsive. I then have to close Snapseed and start all over, so I find myself rushing through editing just to get *something* done before the brush tool and soon after Snapseed becomes unresponsive again. Extremely frustrating when I have a busy schedule in college and can’t spend all day editing each image 5+ times just for one rushed result. Other than that Snapseed is GREAT for what it allows you to do, especially on an iPad. I’d love if this could get fixed so I can continue to use Snapseed well after this class, because when it works, it’s amazing.

Snapseed is very intuitive, and even the advanced features aren't cluttered or overly complicated (that said, performance and accuracy isn't compromised either). There are a lot of features, and I like how you can choose to save your edits step by step, and can see exactly what you did (and even undo!) after a picture is saved. This does everything you need it to do, and if you spend a lot of time you can get professional grade editing.

The only reason I'm not giving this 5/5 is because I seem to be having a problem with the newest update. I can't open pictures, like at all. Even ones I'm certain I've edited with Snapseed. It's a pretty major issue but I don't want to dissuade anyone from getting this because of a bad update, since I've never had a single issue before. Hopefully it will be patched soon.

As many have already expressed their frustration with the latest version, it is prone to crashing. Once it crashes, Snapseed becomes unstable (repeated crashing on app launch or picture selection) which leads me to have to delete and reinstall Snapseed . I have lost quite a few saved “Looks” and a cumulative sum of a few hours because of this issue. It’s still my go-to photo editing app but I have to take precautions when using to avoid lost work/time (eg. “Save a copy” periodically so I can re-import the picture with all the edit steps and re-save as a “look” after Snapseed crashes and is reinstalled). Overall a powerful and feature full app FOR FREE! Highly recommend and I’m anticipating the next update that hopefully address the crashing problem.

-iPhone 8
-iOS 11.4.1

I have enjoyed Snapseed for over a year, recently the export didn’t seem to be working quite right. I have the iPad Pro. So I reinstalled this app and now it works perfect. I have the most current update for my iPad. I hope everyone does this. I also had to do the same for several other apps including Chick-fil-A. I hope others see this and realize it does work. I also have a you tube channel and this is the only app I use for the thumbnail, I like mine to have all the same font and color so I need y’all to reload and try again and update your reviews once you see it does work. I would also gladly pay about 2-5$ or a one time fee to keep developers happy and continue effort to keep this around.

Snapseed freezes and phone hangs when you click on Tools -> Tune Image, or Details. Couldn’t check if selecting any tool does the same thing. But these two tools definitely freeze Snapseed , so much that even the power button doesn’t respond. (That is, you can’t turn off the iPhone screen in this freeze)

Now, the reason I wrote all this in a review is - this app is the best Photo editing app, even for professionals! Apart from some tuneups I am expecting in future, I rely a lot on Snapseed, and hence want it to keep performing awesome. Otherwise, my workflow is broken when there’s even a slightest bug.

I have both Lightroom and this app and they do different things for me. Some tuneups to images are only seamlessly possible in this app.

This is my favorite app! No one can believe my photos come from my iPhone. I use this app to really perfect and fine tune. The reason why I am not giving it 5 stars is because a new update is creating very faint vertical lines in the original photo before editing. To give an example, it looks like a photo taken of a picture on a computer screen. The original image (found in the photo album) does not have the lines. It only shows when opened in this app. The lines become even more apparent when using an editing tool. I will give it 5 stars when the lines go away. Other than that, still my favorite editing app.

First of all, I like its handy, effective, I don’t need to import pictures into laptop and use Adobe photoshop. Nowadays, people take pictures with no serious purpose, maybe just for posting on social media. A quick makeover is all its purpose. I used serious photo tools long time ago, often it was very time consuming to accomplish a small task. Now this app provides a lot of practical tools, with newer version, Looks->Last edits saves one time for similar batch processing, Tools->True image->Ambiance is my favorite tool to correct color tones, brightness at one time, Tools->True image->Shadows is also useful to save pictures with sharp contrast. Besides, I found Snapseed is easiest to learn. Just select a sample picture, then apply each tool to examine the outcome, it’s fun!

Truly amazing I have been creating all types of fine photography and art with this app for years ever since its beginning. Love the new features continue to upgrade because I feel as though I'm the ambassador and would love to see more! Every one thinks I'm on a computer editing Lightroom or ps but I'm on this app that goes for every single piece of my work check my | IG:poorspirit | and you'll see! Please make changes for face enhancement it destroys shadows on face and neck far too often i have to dodge & burn. I think medium leaves orange tint around face and hair and it gets noticeable sometimes. Last when I deeply edit as I should catching the small details once I pass about 6 layers the image beings to distort and has pixels and rings in shadows & highlights. HEALING DONE TO IMAGE IS ALTERED INCORRECT AFTER IMAGE IS SAVED!!!!!

I have been using this app for over a year now. I use a plethora of other photo editing apps (Photoshop, Pixlr, Enlight, Aviary, Facetune, etc). Hands down, this has so much more to offer than any other app and I find this to be my go to App. The Tools that make this so worth while: the HD tool, healing tool, and the selective area tool (allowing you to lighten or enhance any portion of the photograph). Having said that, there is only one tool that I do still need that is offered in other apps and is not available on this app. A blur tool. I find when I am in need of this tool I resort to Aviary (no longer supported) or Facetune. If this was included, I would have no reason to use any other App. Thank you this app, maybe someday you would consider adding a blur tool.

I’ve contacted Apple and they couldn’t help me. I’ve been using this app for almost a year to edit photos I take daily. I save my edited version over the original to save space on my phone. Over the past 2 days (since the iPhone iOS update) random photos I’ve edited will revert to their original version on their own. They’ll save for a period of say 12 hours and then I’ll go into my photos library to use that photo and all the edits are gone. This only happens to SOME photos I’ve edited. Not all. Is there anything you can do to fix the issue? Otherwise, I LOVE this app. But I spend a large amount of time getting my photos perfect and can’t afford to waste my time editing everything over and over.

I have been a major fan of this app for years, turning many friends onto its powerful photo editing tools. But with the latest update in June of 2018, it has all of a sudden become unreliable. I recently returned from a 3-day trek into the Grand Canyon, and spent an hour editing photos using this app. Yesterday I went to post some of the pics, and more than half of the photos I had edited had reverted to their unedited state. Confused, I spent another hour editing the photos, and then posted a couple on Instagram. Today, I went to post another photo, and discovered yet again, several of my photos had automatically reverted to their unedited state. I can share screenshots showing one of the photos I posted to Instagram looks totally different that the photo on my phone now. This is extremely frustrating, time-wasting and makes me lose complete faith in trusting my photos to this app. Please, please fix this!!!!