Apple clarifies that Texture and Grain controls are exclusive to the latest iPhones’ cameras

is a senior reporter who’s been covering and reviewing the latest gadgets and tech since 2006, but has loved all things electronic since he was a kid.

Apple’s new texture and grain controls for stylizing photos will be more limited on older phones than initially expected.

A confusingly worded press release from Apple indicated that the new features, announced alongside the iPhone 18 and 18 Pro earlier this month, would be “available” on older devices like the iPhone 16 and iPhone Air that “support the latest generation of Photographic Styles.”

But it turns out that “available” didn’t mean that older iPhone models would have full access to those new features.

Making texture adjustments to enhance or smooth a subject’s skin and adding film grain will only be an option when those phones are being used to edit shots taken with the latest iPhone models. Apple has since updated recent press releases to state that those controls will only be available for “photos captured on iPhone 18 Pro models and the Ultra Wide, Main, and Center Stage cameras on iPhone Duo.”

The original version of a September 11th release, which was issued the day before the latest versions of the iPhone and Apple Watches became available for preorder, is still available in its original form on other websites with a footnote specifying that the new “texture and grain controls in Photographic Styles will be available on iOS 27 on iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro, iPhone 16 Pro Max, iPhone 17, iPhone Air, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 18 Pro Max, and iPhone Duo.”

This limited compatibility was corroborated by a Reddit user who was able to make adjustments to texture and grain on their iPhone 16 Pro Max, but only while editing sample photos taken on an iPhone 18 Pro by photographer Austin Mann who made them available for download on his website. I also had access to those new Photographic Styles controls when editing Mann’s samples on my own iPhone 16 Pro running iOS 27, but they were not available on photos I captured myself.

The Verge has reached out to Apple for clarification on how the feature is supposed to work on older phones but did not immediately get a response.

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