The iPhone 16’s Camera Control feature arrived to mixed reviews, including from me. But iOS 18.2 upgrades the feature in several key ways, making it what it was always meant to be.
The biggest change for Camera Control in iOS 18.2 is visual intelligence.
By pressing and holding Camera Control, your iPhone’s camera can be activated in a special mode that provides key data about the world around you and shortcuts to act on that data.
Here’s how Apple describes it:
Users can click and hold Camera Control to pull up the hours or ratings for a restaurant they pass, add an event from a flyer to their calendar, quickly identify a dog by breed, and more. Camera Control will also serve as a gateway into third-party tools with specific domain expertise, like when users want to search on Google to find where they can buy an item, or to benefit from ChatGPT’s problem-solving skills.
My colleague Fernando made a video that describes 10 different uses of visual intelligence. I check it a lot to see what your iPhone 16 can do now in iOS 18. 2.
Another key upgrade in iOS 18.2 is that you can use Camera Control to launch the Camera app faster than ever before.
By visiting Settings ⇾ Display & Brightness, look for a new option for camera control: “Require screen to be on. “
iOS 18. 2 enables this option by default, allowing camera control to work as it has. But if you turn it off, you can release the camera even when the iPhone screen is off.
This is basically one step and allows you to capture a symbol faster. You no longer need to tap Camera Control once to wake up the device and then briefly to release the camera (or tap the screen first to wake it up).
Just grab your iPhone, tap Camera Control, and your camera is ready to go.
iOS 18. 2 introduces a two-step shutter feature as Apple demonstrated in September.
Under Settings ⇾ Camera ⇾ Camera Control, there is a new AE/AF lock lever.
It’s smart that they’re already adding innovations and listening to feedback, but it’s still too restrictive to have access to just the camera features. This deserves to have been announced as Action Button 2. 0 for traditional actions. You deserve to be able to use it to scroll up and down Internet pages, search for videos, maybe even assign it to the volume control and use the two existing volume buttons as two additional action buttons!
Enabling this means that lightly pressing the Camera Control will lock focus and exposure, so you can lightly press to lock in those details and then press harder to take the photo.
There is also a new option in Settings ⇾ Accessibility ⇾ Camera control at the speed of a double-click action. You can choose from 3 options: Default, Slow, and Slower.
The camera in iOS 18. 2 is the feature that Apple was obviously looking to offer with the iPhone 16, but couldn’t. This makes the new engaged button much more useful than before, making it the main feature it was meant to be.
Have you been using Camera Control in iOS 18.2? What do you think of the changes? Let us know in the comments.
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Ryan started in journalism as an editor at MacStories, where he worked for 4 years covering Apple news, writing app reviews, and more. For two years, he co-hosted the Adapt podcast on Relay FM, which was completely faithful to the iPad. That’s why it’s no surprise that your favorite Apple device is the iPad Pro.