Google Photos

Google Photos is a photograph and video sharing and storage service by Google. It was announced in May 2015 and spun out from Google+, the company's social network. At its launch, reviewers wrote that the service was among the best of its kind.

Its core features were previously embedded within Google+, the company's social network. The new Google Photos includes unlimited photo and video storage, and apps for Android, iOS, and the browser. Users back up their photos to the cloud service, and become accessible between all of their devices connected to the service.

The Photos service analyzes and organizes images into groups and can identify features such as beaches, skylines, or "snowstorms in Toronto". From the application's search window, users are shown potential searches for groups of photos in three major categories: People, Places, and Things. The service analyzes photos for similar faces and groups them together in the People category. It can also group faces as they age. The Places category uses geotagging data but can also determine locations in older pictures by analyzing for major landmarks (e.g., photos containing the Eiffel Tower). The Things category processes photos for their subject matter: birthdays, buildings, cats, concerts, food, graduations, posters, screenshots, etc. Users can manually remove categorization errors.

Your assistant shows you fun new things automatically created from your photos & helps you stay organized

Recipients of shared images can view web galleries without needing to download the app. Users can swipe their fingers across the screen to adjust the service's photo editing settings, as opposed to using sliders. Images can be easily shared with social networks (Google+, Facebook, Twitter) and other services. The application generates web links that both Google Photos users and non-users can access.