Oh no, I shot a photo at the wrong aspect ratio on my iPhone! Well, here’s how to fix it

IPhone aspect ratios.

There are lots of reasons to change the aspect ratio of your photos when shooting with an iPhone. The 16:9 ratio is a perfect fit for phone and computer displays, while the 4:3 ratio is a closer match for iPad and tablet displays and a square 1:1 ratio is (or was, dammit) a perfect match for instagram.

And if you want to know what aspect ratios actually are available, tap the arrow at the top of the Camera app display to show more options at the bottom. You’ll see that one of these is labelled ‘16:9’, ‘4:3’ or ‘Square’. This is basically the ratio between the width of the picture and its height, and when you tap the button to try the different options, you’ll see that the photo is cropped differently for each one.

So if you choose an aspect ratio and then shoot, the Camera app will crop the scene to that shape. Does that mean you’re stuck with it and you can’t change it later? No!

How to un-crop and re-crop photos on your iPhone

The iPhone’s sensor has a ‘native’ aspect ratio of 4:3 – that’s 4 units by 3 units, so it’s rectangular rather than square. But you can also shoot at a 16:9 ratio or a 1:1 (square) ratio. What happens here is that the iPhone simply crops off some of the top or the bottom or the sides to get the new shape.

But these cropped-off areas are not gone for good – they’re still there. If you edit your photo in the iOS or macOS Photos app and choose the Crop option, you’ll find the original 4:3 image is still there in its entirety.

If I open my 16:9 ratio photo in the Apple Photos app on my Mac and then click the Reset button bottom right, my original 4:3 ratio photo is restored. The iPhone always shoots using its full 4:3 ratio sensor area and crops your image according to your choice afterwards. (Image credit: Rod Lawton)

You can also swap to a range of different aspect/crop ratios in the iPhone Photos app. (Image credit: Rod Lawton)

Now you’ve got a choice! If your photo isn’t quite framed correctly you can tap-drag it to move the crop area up and down a little (16:9 images) or left to right (square images). In this way you’ve got some unexpected leeway to reframe your photos if you didn’t frame them quite right when you took them.

Or you can change the aspect ratio completely. In the iOS Photos app you’ll see a padlock in the top right of the crop area – tap this to unlock it. Now you can drag the crop boundaries to where you want them or you can tap the Aspect button at the top of the screen and then choose from a wider range of aspect ratios from a list at the bottom.

So you definitely should experiment with your iPhone’s aspect ratios. If you choose 16:9 or Square then you will have a little reframing flexibility later on that you might not have been expecting, and if you decide you chose the wrong ratio altogether you can simply revert to the full 4:3 ratio image area and start again!