View photos and videos in the Photos app on iPad

Use the Photos app to find and view all of the photos and videos on your iPad.

On the left side of a screen in Photos is a sidebar to select Library, For You, People, Places, and other categories; Library is selected. The rest of the screen shows the photo library in All Photos view. At the top of the photo library is the date and location where the photos were taken. In the top center are options to view photos by Years, Months, Days, and All Photos; All Photos is selected. In the top right of the screen are the Aspect, Select, and More buttons.

How photos and videos are organized in Photos

Swipe from the left edge of the screen, or tap , to open the sidebar and navigate Photos. Tap an item in the sidebar to see photos organized in different ways.

Library: Browse your photos and videos organized by days, months, years, and all photos; see Browse photos in your library.
For You: View your memories, shared photos, featured photos, and sharing suggestions in a personalized feed; see Watch memories in Photos.
People: Browse your photos by the people Photos identifies in them; see Find and identify people in Photos on iPad.
Places: Browse by the locations where the photos were taken; see Browse photos by location on iPad.
Utilities and Media Types: View albums automatically created to organize your photos by categories—for example, Videos and Live Photos.
Albums: View albums you created or shared; see Use photo albums in Photos on iPad and Use iCloud Shared Albums with iPad.

Browse photos in your library

To browse your photos and videos by when they were taken, tap Library, then select any of the following:

Years: Quickly locate a specific year in your photo library.
Months: View collections of photos that you took throughout a month, organized by significant events—like a family outing, social occasion, birthday party, or trip.
Days: View your best photos in chronological order, grouped by the time or place the photos were taken.
All Photos: View all of your photos and videos.

Tip: When viewing All Photos, pinch the screen to zoom in or out. You can also tap to zoom in or out, view photos by aspect ratio, filter photos, or show photos on a map.

The photo library displayed in Days view. A selection of photo thumbnails fills the screen. In the top left of the screen is the Photos button to open the sidebar. Below the Photos button is the date and location where the photos displayed on the screen were taken. In the top center are options to browse photos by Years, Months, Days, or All Photos; Days is selected. In the top right of the screen are the Select and More Options buttons.

Years, Months, and Days views are curated to show your best shots, and visual clutter like similar photos, screenshots, whiteboards, and receipts aren’t shown. To see every photo and video, tap All Photos.

View individual photos

Tap a photo to view it in full screen on your iPad.

Double-tap or pinch out to zoom in on the photo—drag to see other parts of the photo; double-tap or pinch closed to zoom back out.

A full-screen photo with thumbnails of other photos from the library across the bottom of the screen. At the top left is the Back button, Along the top right are the Share, Favorite, Info, Delete, and Edit buttons.

Tip: When viewing a Live Photo , touch and hold the photo to play it.

Tap to add the photo to your Favorites album. See Use photo albums in Photos.

Tap or drag the photo down to continue browsing or return to the search results.

See photo and video information

To see saved metadata information about a photo or video, open it, then tap or swipe up. Depending on the photo or video, you see the following details:

People identified in the photo
A caption field to describe the photo or video, and make it easier to find in Search
Items detected by Visual Look Up
Whether the photo was shared with you in Messages or another app, or iCloud Shared Photo Library
The date and time the photo or video was taken; tap Adjust to edit the date and time
Camera metadata such as lens, shutter speed, file size, and more
Where the photo or video was taken; tap the link to view the location in Maps; tap Adjust to edit the location

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