It’s hard to believe that Google photos was introduced only two years ago, but that’s the fact. At “I/O ’17” Google made some announcements around Google Photos enhancements. Google Photos is no joke saying that it now has more than 500 million people use it every month. And they are backing up more than 1.2 billion photos and videos per day. How crazy is that number? Their ads should read “we have a Gazillion photos!” Google Photos is announcing three new ways to help you “share and receive the meaningful moments of your life.” 

If you are not using Google Photos, these 3 new features may entice you, But to be honest, Google Photos was solid out of the box 2 years ago. These are nice additions and I highly recommend you see what else Google Photos can do. Just being able to search your thousands of photos with image recognition is enough. And yes you can get it on iOS too. Download the iOS version here or the Android version here.

“500 million people using Google Photos a month”

Photo Books

Apple folks will recognize this feature as they have been doing this great for some years. Google can think them for paving the way. Not sure if Google will do it any better but it’s a nice feature.

Photo books are incredibly easy to make—even on your phone. They’re beautiful, high quality, with a clean and modern design. And thanks to our powerful search technology, your photos are already organized by the people, places, or things that matter. Once you select the photos, Google Photos will find the best shots for you—removing duplicates and poor quality images. All that’s left for you to do is make a few tweaks and place your order. Soon, we’ll even suggest photo books just for you, like your trip to the Grand Canyon, time with family during the holidays, your puppy, or even your kid’s artwork.

Photo books are rolling out in the U.S. on web, and on Android and iOS next week, starting at just $9.99 for a 20-page softcover book and $19.99 for a hardcover book. We’ll bring photo books to more countries soon.

Suggested Sharing

How many times have you forgotten to share that group shot with everyone else in it? Or how often do you have to ask your spouse to send those cute pictures of the kids?

With Google’s new sharing suggestions, you can finally share and receive all the photos that really matter to you, without the work. Using machine learning technology, Google Photos will not only remind you to share—it will automatically select the right photos, and even suggest who you should send them to based on who was in the photos. Just tap send, and your friends and family will see all your photos, and get a reminder to add theirs too. Now all the photos of that birthday dinner or weekend trip are in one place, including—and especially—the photos you didn’t take.

Shared Libraries

Share with that special person you share just about everything with, like your spouse, partner or best friend? Wouldn’t it be easier if you could  automatically share relevant photos with them? For example, I would love it if every photo I ever took of my kids was shared with my wife.

With Shared Libraries, you can effortlessly and automatically send and receive photos with one other person. You can give them access to your full photo library or, if you prefer, only photos of certain people or from a certain date forward. And when they share their library with you, you can automatically save the photos you want so they also show up in search and in the movies, collages and other fun creations Google Photos makes for you. Gone are the days of begging your partner for those special pictures only stored on their phone.

Google Lens

At Google’s I/O developer conference, CEO Sundar Pichai announced a new technology called Google Lens. The idea with the product is to leverage Google’s computer vision and AI technology in order to bring smarts directly to your phone’s camera. As Google explains, the smartphone camera won’t just see what you see, but will also understand what you see to help you take action.

Google showed off how you could point your camera at something and Lens tells you what it is — like, it could identify the restaurnat your in front of and provide more information. In another example, Pichai showed how Lens could do a common task — connecting you to a home’s Wi-Fi network by snapping a photo of the sticker on the router.

The Google Lens features aren’t ready for Google Photos yet, but the machine learning engine is coming later this summer. Google Lens will be able to understand what’s in an image, identify what you’re looking at, and help you edit photos on the fly. It’ll even get rid of obstructions in an image — in the event you actually catch your finger ruining an an otherwise amazing photo, for example.

The promo video by Google Photos