10 Best Free Photo Editing Apps for iOS and Android in 2025

With the growing demand for high-quality photo editing apps, finding the right tool for your iPhone or Android can take your pictures to the next level. Whether you're a pro or just love capturing moments, the right app can enhance, refine, and transform your photos effortlessly. In this guide, we’ll explore the best free photo editing apps packed with powerful features to help you create stunning visuals with ease.

• Top 3 Free Photo Editing Apps Snapshot
• 10 Best Free Photo Editing Apps
• How to Choose the Best Free Photo Editing App
• How We Test the Best Photo Editing Apps on Our List
• What Can You Do With a Good Photo Editing App
• How to Edit Photos on iPhone & Android
• FAQs of Best Photo Editing Apps

Top 3 Free Photo Editing Apps Snapshot

10 Best Free Photo Editing Apps

1. PhotoDirector
2. Vivid Glam
3. Promeo
4. YouCam Perfect
5. Pixlr
6. PicsArt
7. Snapseed
8. Adobe Photoshop Camera
9. Werble
10. Canva

1. PhotoDirector - Best Free Photo Editor App

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 10/10

Key Features:

• AI tools like AI Removal & AI Enhancer
• Color correction & adjustment tools to fine-tune your photos
• Portrait editing & beauty retouching features including eye bags removal and teeth whitening
• Vast selection of filters, effects & overlays
• Built-in Stock Library to access millions of royalty-free images from iStock and Unsplash

PhotoDirector is a powerful photo editing app that combines full creative control with a user-friendly interface and a vast library of royalty-free content from iStock and Unsplash. Whether you're a beginner or an experienced editor, you can effortlessly transform any photo into a stunning masterpiece.

After extensive testing across multiple apps, we found PhotoDirector to be the best photo editing solution available. It offers an unparalleled range of creative tools, including over 400 themed filters, advanced AI editing features to refine every detail, and built-in tutorials to help you bring your vision to life.

2. Vivid Glam - Best AI Image Generator App

Compatibility: iOS

Overall Rating: 9/10

Key Features:

• Virtual Makeup Filters
• AI Retouch Tools
• Virtually Try on Clothes
• Change Photo Background

If you're looking for an AI-powered beauty editing app, Vivid Glam is a top choice. This app excels at enhancing facial features with effortless AI-driven tools, making it easy to achieve a flawless look.

With Vivid Glam, you can smooth your skin, brighten your eyes, apply virtual makeup, and whiten your teeth—all with just a few taps. What sets it apart is its ability to slim your waistline and even rejuvenate your face in videos, extending its functionality beyond photo editing.

3. Promeo - Best Photo Editing App For Business

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 9/10

Key Features:

• Remove Photo Background
• Add White Background to a Photo
• Blur Photo Background
• Templates For All occasions

Promeo's standout feature lies in its remarkable ability to remove photo backgrounds with exceptional clarity. Say goodbye to the distracting clutter of your original image and hello to a clean, professional look. Whether you need a transparent background, a solid white backdrop, or even a beautifully blurred background to make your product pop, Promeo offers a wide range of background options that cater to your specific needs. There are all templates for all industries to create posters, design flyers or generate Instagram posts within a blink!

4. YouCam Perfect: Best Free Photo Editor

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 10/10

Key Features:

• AI Object Removal
• Background changer and sky replacement
• Face retouch and body editing tools

YouCam Perfect is one of the best free photo editors equipped with AI-powered photo editing and beautifying tools. It allows you to edit photos on either iPhone or Android with a wide variety of effects, animations, collages, and more! 

It also supports advanced tools like "AI Object Removal" that helps you effortlessly remove unwanted objects, change your background in seconds, or get dreamy skies in 1 tap with "Sky Replacement". If you want to retouch your face or edit your body shape, YouCam Perfect has various face editing tools and Body Tuner features.

5. Pixlr - Best Photo Editor For Filters

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 8/10

Key Features:

• Basic editing tools, filters, and photo effects
• Collage templates for easy creation
• Auto Fix to adjust color of photo
• Color Splash effect to bring out color

Pixlr specializes in providing just enough variety for users. You won't ever feel overwhelmed by the available options. Still, you can use intuitive brushes as well as preset effects, overlays, and style filters to transform your photos into black-and-white, film, or sepia tones.

While Pixlr is free to download, the free version of the app has ads and limits your access to editing tools.

Casual users may enjoy the simplicity of the Pixlr app, but anyone who wants access to comprehensive editing tools and advanced effects may find Pixlr lacking in more than one area. Pixlr's Premium subscription, however, does offer access to more editing tools.

6. PicsArt - Best Video & Photo Editor App

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 8/10

Key Features:

• Good lineup of editing tools for casual photographers
• Wide variety of stickers, filters, and personalized collage
• AI tools including AI image generator, AI replace and AI Avatar

PicsArt combines community with a user-friendly editing app for a fun, creative experience without a lot of hassle. While the free app features ads that pop up while editing, even those who are brand new to photo editing can access all the basic tools while enjoying stickers, collage templates, and text functions.

You can also use PicsArt with your camera, applying filters, effects, and overlays to photos before you take them. Quickly crop, resize, flip/rotate, and enhance photos using the PicsArts "Effect" menu, or use the Dispersion tool to create dramatic images with the click of a finger.

If your interest in photography extends to sharing daily moments with your family, then PicsArt's functional tools can help you make minor tweaks and adjustments to your snaps. You can also enjoy trendy filters, colorful text, cloning options, and an eraser tool to remove objects from your photos.

Unlike some other free editing apps, PicsArt even offers a "Motion" effect, allowing you to animate your images.

However, the major disadvantage to the PicsArt lies in its pricey premium subscription and lack of truly advanced editing tools such as sky replacement, light rays, and other features.

7. Snapseed - Best Photo Editor App for Casual Users

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 8/10

Key Features:

• Over 30 professional-quality editing tools
• Presets and filters for one-tap editing

Snapseed is a powerful, pro-level photo editing app packed with advanced tools like curves, selective editing, and detailed color adjustments. Ideal for experienced photographers and content creators, it allows for layered edits, custom "Looks," and precise enhancements like skin smoothing and lens blur. While its streamlined interface is user-friendly, the extensive toolset may overwhelm casual users seeking quick edits. However, if you're comfortable with editing, Snapseed offers unmatched customization—plus, it's completely free with no premium features.

8. Adobe Photoshop Camera - Best Photo Editor For Taking Pictures

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 8/10

Key Features:

• Dozens of custom and regularly updated filters
• Auto-tone effects
• Face light feature for portraits

Photoshop Camera uses Adobe Sensei AI to apply masks, effects, and corrections before or after capturing an image. Its filters, called "lenses," offer vibrant colors, lighting options, and even animated elements like shooting stars. Adobe frequently adds new lenses with multiple variations for creative, one-tap transformations. However, with limited editing tools and no advanced features like sky replacement or Bokeh, it’s best suited for casual users rather than serious creators.

9. Werble - Best Photo Editor For Adding Overlays

Compatibility: iOS

Overall Rating: 8/10

Key Features:

• Dozens of visual effects templates
• A solid lineup of movement presets for animation
• Supports layers for unique animation

Werble's fun visual effects and simplified layout make it a suitable choice for social media content. The animation effects won’t result in professional-quality results, but the app can add a unique touch to your images thanks to various effects packets and animated overlays.

10. Canva - Best Photo Editor With Templates

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 8/10

Key Features:

• Variety of templates for all occasions
• Text effects
• Photo filters
• Auto focus to blur background

Canva's primary appeal is its library of versatile, customizable templates. You can sort through Canva's existing templates, choose one that suits your design aesthetic and make personalized adjustments.

The app also provides graphics that you can use in your Instagram story creations. If you'd prefer not to create a story from one of the app's templates, you can access Canva's library of elements to craft a post of your own creation.

While Canva does offer a limited array of photo effects, if you want to produce any professional-level photography edits, you will need to look for a more advanced app. Canva's photo effects are limited to resizing, adjusting color, and overlaying filters onto your photo.

11. FaceTune - Best Selfie App

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 7/10

Key Features:

• Extensive editing features for skin touch-ups
• Face reshaping and makeup features
• Several Neon filters and light effects
• AI tool to try on clothes

The first time you open FaceTune, you are asked for your photo editing skill level to ensure you have the best app experience. As the app name already implies, FaceTune’s features are more focused on face editing and involve skin smoothening, face reshaping, or changing hair colors. You can also virtually put on makeup or change your skin color thanks to the Paint tool.

Besides face editing tools, the app also offers tools such as different patterns for clothing you can easily swap with the ones you are wearing in the image. The Backdrop tool lets you easily replace the existing background with one of FaceTune’s backdrop templates such as flowers, butterflies, or sparkles.

The photo editing app is very beginner-friendly as it provides a walk-through for every feature to guide the user through the process. Overall, FaceTune is a good photo editing app for those who love to touch up their selfies.

All features in FaceTune are free to use for the first 7 days; after that, you can upgrade to a subscription or perpetual license.

12. Prisma - Best App to Turn Anything Into a Painting

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 6/10

Key Features:

• 700+ billion painting styles
• Variety of frames
• One-click background swap
• Frequent filter updates

Turning your photo into a painting in Prisma is easy and just a matter of one click.

The painting styles are named after art techniques such as Dallas, Mosaic, or Gothic or after artists such as Thota Vaikuntan or Daryl Feril.

You can also clip the background to automatically apply the style to just the person in the image and leave the original background. After you have applied the desired painting style, you can choose from a variety of frames to put your edited image in the right light.

Furthermore, you can control the effect’s intensity and saturation on the person or do some more touch-ups to the background to match the new image.

One disadvantage of Prisma is that in order to access the photo editing app you have to subscribe to their service first and then manually cancel the 3-day free trial period.

Overall, this photo editing app is very straightforward and easy to use. However, the automatic subscription might not be everyone's favorite, especially when you tend to easily forget about canceling subscriptions.

13. PicCollage - Best Photo Editing App for Collages

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 6/10

Key Features:

• Tons of collage frames and designs
• Basic photo editing including filter, cutout, retouch
• Fonts and stickers to personalize collages

PicCollage is our favorite photo editing app that specializes in photo collages. With a very user friendly interface, this app allows you to select which aspect ratio you’d like, then it spits out dozens upon dozens of different grids to use for your photos.

The frames are not just the standard squares and rectangles, either. You can also choose slanted shapes, circles, stars, hearts, or even a honeycomb pattern. The app also gives you lots of freedom of choice when selecting the sizes of each picture in your collage.

There are also frequent template releases of seasonal themes and for life milestones. So whether the Fall season has just begun and you want to celebrate Labor Day, or you just had a baby and want a perfect themed collage, PicCollage is a great photo editing app with customizable frames in which to put your photos.

There is a 7-day free trial with a good selection of themed stickers with the free version, but you need a subscription to unlock all the features, including removing that pesky watermark.

14. BeFunky - Best Photo Editing App for Simple AI-Powered Photo Editing

Compatibility: iOS, Android

Overall Rating: 6/10

Key Features:

• A.I.-powered editing tools
• Artsy effects to turn photo into painting
• Background remover
• Portrait Enhancer to enhance photo in a single tap

BeFunky is a fun photo editing app that keeps photography lighthearted for enthusiasts while still leveraging powerful tools to achieve great results.

As soon as you open the app, you are prompted to select what you’d like to use the app for. We appreciate that BeFunky gets right to the point, asking what you would like to do with the app, rather than having you spend lots of extra time navigating the interface trying to find what you’re looking for.

You can choose from many options, including a background remover, A.I. Portrait Enhancer, Oil Painting or Digital Art creation, and Facebook and Twitter Templates to get the job done.

Something particularly valuable about BeFunky is its powerful A.I. features. The app allows you to leverage A.I. to enhance image appearance, remove backgrounds, and edit faces. However, it is lacking the effects and features that would make it an all-in-one comprehensive photo editing app.

15. Afterlight - Best Photo Editing App for Serious Photographers

Compatibility: iOS

Overall Rating: 5/10

Key Features:

• Preset photo filters
• 90+ textures and overlays
• 120+ hand-picked Fonts and 150+ original Designs

If you don’t like noisy and cluttered apps, you’ll really like Afterlight.

Afterlight is a no-nonsense photo editing app with a simple and understated user interface that features powerful basic editing tools. It’s extremely easy to do basic edits in a variety of ways - from crops to adjustments to brightness, contrast, vibrance, saturation, and more.

The app has many filters and effects including some particularly aesthetic light effects and a very intuitive double exposure effect feature. You can also add text and stickers easily.

After editing your picture, the app makes it very simple to either share directly to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or Messaging apps or you can opt to save your image to your phone.

A feature we found particularly unique among photo editing apps is Afterlight’s simple undo-redo button to cycle through your edits. This makes experimenting with different adjustments and effects very easy, because you can always go back to previous versions of your edited image.

Although stock media options are conspicuously lacking, this photo editing app is a good choice for serious photographers who want a no-nonsense solution to photo editing, without any more advanced features.

How to Choose the Best Free Photo Editing App

Choosing the best free photo editing app to edit your photos might not be easy with so many options. First, you need to decide what you need the app for. Taking selfies? Editing your foodie pictures or enhancing your scenic shots? Depending on your needs, there are several photo editing apps worth noting for general editing or for more professional needs. As far as features go, most photo editing apps reviewed in our list have both basic editing capabilities and the latest popular features. Most apps in our list have a free version with several features to try and a premium version with extra features that can be unlocked by paying a monthly or annual subscription fee.

In short, our list covers the best free photo editing apps for every photo editor out there and we added key feature summaries for each review to make it easier for you to filter them out according to your needs.

How We Test the Best Photo Editing Apps on Our List

First, we consider which photo editing apps are most used for specific categories, and then we have a look at the overall ratings and reviews by the community of users. When testing each app, we look for strengths and weaknesses based on factors such as:

• Compatibility with different mobile devices
• Clear and easy-to-use interface
• Quality and variety of features
• Frequency of updates
• Integrated stock content

We would also consider each app’s intended audience when rating it – after all, it’s hard to compare a professional photo editing app like Photoshop to a face editing app like FaceTune.

What Can You Do With a Good Photo Editing App

Good photo editing apps are extremely handy when you’re taking lots of pictures, you have an added desire to either stand out or have more creative control, and you’d like quick and easy solutions and a variety of options to get there.

Most successful social media influencers depend on photo editing of some kind to help differentiate them from other influencers. Using stickers, animation, image overlays, or free photo filters helps them curate their feed, gain followers, and express their individuality. If you’re trying to boost your social media presence, having the best photo editing app is essential.

If you’re putting together photo collages or an album for a specific purpose (for example, a wedding, graduation party, memorial service, or other event), a good photo editing app can do a lot of the work for you and its features can allow your pictures to leave a far more impactful impression.

How to Edit Photos on iPhone & Android

Learn how to edit photos with all the trendy AI features such as AI Removal, AI Enhance, AI Avatar and more with taps on your phone.

1. Download the best free photo editing app – PhotoDirector
2. Choose the AI feature from the entry.
3. Import the Photo to Edit.
• To remove objects from the photo, click AI removal.
• To enhance the photo with a click, tap AI Enhance.
• To create Avatars from photos, click AI Avatar.
• To retouch photos for flawless skin, click on Beautify.
• To apply picture filters or add text to the photo, click Edit and freely explore all photo editing features.
4. After finishing editing the photo, click the icon at the upper right side. You can save the photo to the album or share with your friends.