Google is testing a quality-of-life upgrade to Google Photos that will make it quicker and easier to organize your pictures, especially when you have an extensive collection of similar images.
As revealed in a recent Android Authority report, Google Photos’ popular Photo Stacks feature could soon be getting a usability upgrade that makes it quicker and easier to use. Google Introduced Photo Stacks in 2024 as a way to group similar photos into “stacks” which tidy away near-duplicate pictures behind your favorite of the bunch, which you get to mark as “top pick.”
Currently, any actions involving Photo Stacks require you to swipe up on the image you’re viewing to view the full photo details. Here, you can find management options for the stack, such as “Add to album,” “Move to Archive,” “Set at wallpaper,” etc.
Google Photos: New Photo Stacks Interface
The new interface, which hasn’t yet been enabled for users, adds a pop-up context menu below the picture when you’re viewing a member of a photo stack. By tapping on a small arrow near the bottom of the screen, you can quickly bring up a menu of commands including:
- Set as top pick (provided you’re not already viewing the top pick)
- Keep this, delete rest
- Remove from stack
- Unstack
- Multi-select
- Manage stacks
The first four of these menu options largely mirror the Photo Stack controls currently available by swiping up, but make them quicker and easier to access by separating them from the long list of options in the details pane unrelated to Photo Stacks. The new “Multi-select,” menu option replaces the current multi-select icon, depicted as four tiny squares, that sits to the left of the image selector, whereas selecting “Manage stacks” takes you to the “Photos view” settings menu where you can turn the Photos Stacks feature on or off.
The new interface was discovered by well-known app analyst AssembleDebug, who discovered and enabled the code for the new Photo Stack menu, which is hidden in the latest version 7.19 of the Google Photos Android app. As is always the case with unreleased features like this, there’s no guarantee that it will roll out to users in its current form. However, it gives us insight into how Google constantly evolves Google Photos to improve usability over time. The Photo Stacks feature has seen a lot of tinkering since it was first introduced, but not all test features have made it into the hands of users. Most notably, we’re still waiting for the ability to create Photo Stacks manually.
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