Apple introduces the Extend feature in iOS 27, enabling users to widen tightly framed photos with AI-generated content, signalling a major shift towards smarter on-device editing tools.
Apple’s latest Photos tools in iOS 27 give iPhone and iPad users a way to rescue images that feel too tightly framed. The new Extend feature uses Apple Intelligence to generate additional content beyond the original edges of a picture, effectively widening the composition after the shot has been taken. Apple says the tool is not suitable for every image, but it is designed to help when a subject was captured too close to the frame. According to MacRumors, the feature is part of a broader set of AI editing tools arriving in iOS 27, iPadOS 27 and macOS 27. The publication also reported that Apple plans to preview the software at WWDC 2026.
To use Extend, a user opens the Photos app, selects an image and taps Edit. From there, the Apple Intelligence tools icon appears, and Extend can be chosen from that menu. The image can then be enlarged by pinching inward with two fingers or by dragging the black corner handles, before confirming the change with the Extend button. Beebom and other guides describe the same workflow, noting that the AI then fills in the newly created space with generated detail.
The feature is limited by the image itself. Apple’s interface can show a message that no edges can be extended, which indicates the photo does not give the model enough context to build out the frame convincingly. When the tool does work, the process may take several minutes as Apple Intelligence creates the expanded version. AppleInsider has said the feature is especially useful for correcting overly tight crops and improving composition without returning to the camera roll’s original shot.
Extend is one part of Apple’s wider effort to make the Photos app a more capable editing environment. MacRumors has said the iOS 27 package also includes Enhance, which adjusts colour and lighting automatically, and Reframe, which changes the perspective of spatial photos. GadgetHacks reported that Apple is also upgrading Cleanup, its object-removal tool. Taken together, the additions suggest Apple is pushing more advanced editing directly into the operating system rather than relying on third-party apps.
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