How to delete anyone from selfies on iPhone with new AI trick – but you might need to change setting to unlock it first

APPLE is about to add a selfie-correcting AI trick to remove anything – or anyone – from your photos.

It’s built directly into the Photos app and will be out in days.

The feature is called Clean Up and it’s part of the new set of Apple Intelligence features.

WHAT IS CLEAN UP?

Apple Intelligence is a collection of features announced back in June.

Your iPhone will be upgraded with loads of AI-powered tricks, and they’re now starting to roll out.

One of those is called Clean Up, and it’s designed to remove unwanted parts of photos.

It’s not a totally new idea: Google Pixel phones that run on Android already offer this.

But it’s the first time that this feature will have been made available to iPhone users as a core part of iOS.

Apple explains: “Remove distractions in your photos with the Clean Up tool in the Photos app.

“Apple Intelligence identifies background objects so you can remove them with a tap and perfect your shot — while staying true to the original image.”

When you use Clean Up, the built-in AI will make an educated guess about what the object should be replaced with.

For instance, it might swap it out for trees, or grass, or a wall – all depending on what the rest of your image looks like.

Finding the feature is easy: you’ll simply go into the default Photos app and bring up an image.

Then go into the edit menu where you’d normally find the Adjust, Filter, and Crop options.

There should be a new option called Clean Up, which has an icon that looks like an eraser.

Choose it, and then simply “tap, brush, or circle” the object that you want to remove.

You can use two fingers to pan around the image if you’re zoomed in.

Once you’re happy, hit the Done button and your edit will be saved.

And if you change your mind, you can go back into the edit menu and revert the photo to its original state.

So how do you actually get Clean Up on iPhone?

HOW TO GET CLEAN UP ON YOUR IPHONE

There are several ways to get Clean Up, depending on your situation.

The first thing to note is that you’ll need a phone that can run iOS 18 – so that rules very old iPhone models out.

Then you’ll need to make sure you have an iPhone that can run Apple Intelligence.

That very severely limits the iPhone models that get this feature.

The full list is:

• iPhone 15 Pro
• iPhone 15 Pro Max
• iPhone 16
• iPhone 16 Plus
• iPhone 16 Pro
• iPhone 16 Pro Max

Then you’ve got a few options.

If your iPhone is set to US English then Clean Up will arrive next week with the iOS 18.1 update.

Apple hasn’t confirmed an exact launch day, but iOS updates often arrive on Mondays – so keep an eye out on Tuesday morning.

If you’re using iOS on UK English, you’ll get Clean Up with iOS 18.2 in December.

However, you could switch your device and Siri language to US English to get the feature early.

Or you could sign up to the iOS 18 public beta, which will bring a test UK version of the feature to your iPhone in the next few weeks.

Once you’ve got iOS 18.1 in US English or iOS 18.2 in UK English, you’ll be able to use Clean Up.