Search by people, things and places in your photos

Search your photos for anything. For example, you can search for:

• A wedding that you attended last summer
• Your best friend
• A pet
• Your favourite city

Important: Some features are not available in all countries, all domains or all account types.

Search your photos

1. On your computer, go to photos.google.co.uk/search.
2. In the box at the top, enter what you want to find; for example:
   • London
   • A name or nickname, if you've labelled people or pets.

Find photos of a person or pet, and add a name

To more easily search and manage your photos, you can apply a label to people or pets that appear in photos grouped by Google Photos.

Important: This feature is not available in all countries, all domains or all account types.

Step 1: Find photos of a person or pet

1. On your computer, go to photos.google.co.uk/people.
2. Click a face to see photos of them.

If you don't see a row of faces:

• The feature is not available in your country.
• You turned face grouping off in settings. Learn how to turn on face grouping.
• No face groups have been created.

Tip: To find photos of a person without searching, click Explore People and pets.

Step 2: Add a name

1. At the top of a face group, click Add a name.
2. Enter a name or nickname.

You'll be able to search with that name label using the search box. Only you can see the private face labels that you choose, even if you share those photos.

Tip: To find photos without searching, click Explore. At the top, you can click items like People, Places or Things.

Turn face grouping off or on

To turn face grouping off or on:

1. On your computer, go to photos.google.co.uk/settings.
2. Next to 'Group similar faces', click Show more .
3. Turn face grouping off or on.
   • To turn off face grouping only for photos of pets, turn off Show pets with people.

You can stop grouping photos based on faces that appear in your photos.

If you turn off face grouping, you delete:

• Face groups in your account
• Face models that were used to create those face groups
• Face labels that you created.

Learn about Google Photos' face grouping retention policy.

 

Advanced tips

Change or remove a label

You can edit or remove your face group labels.

• To change a label: Tap People folder More   Edit name label.
• To remove a label: Tap People folder More   Remove name label.

Combine face groups

If the same person is in more than one grouping, you can merge them.

1. Label one of the face groups with a name or nickname.
2. Label the other face group with the same name or nickname, choosing from the suggestions.
3. When you confirm the second name or nickname, Google Photos will ask if you want to merge the face groups.

You might receive a suggestion to merge two face groups. If they're the same person, click Yes.

Remove a face group from the search page

If you don't want to see a certain face group on your search page, you can remove it.

1. On your computer, go to photos.google.co.uk/people.
2. At the top right, click Show and hide faces.
3. Click the face that you want to hide. To show a face, click the box again.
4. At the top right, click Done.

Remove an item from a group

If you see a photo that's in the wrong group, you can take it out.

1. On your computer, go to photos.google.co.uk/people.
2. Click the face group from which you want to remove something.
3. Click More   Remove results.
4. Select the photos or videos that you want to remove from the group.
5. At the top, click Remove.

Tip: If you remove an item from a group, it will not delete the photo or video from your Google Photos library.

Change a feature photo

1. On your computer, go to photos.google.co.uk/people.
2. Click a face group.
3. Click More   Change feature photo.
4. Select a photo to make it the featured photo.

Learn about face models

Face grouping occurs in three steps:

1. We detect whether any photo has a face in it.
2. If the face grouping feature is on, algorithms are used to create face models that numerically represent the images of faces, predict the similarity of different images of faces and estimate whether different images represent the same face.
3. Photos with very similar faces that are likely to be of the same person are grouped together in a face group. You can always remove a photo from a face group if you think it's in the wrong group.

You can also add a name or nickname label to any face group.

When face grouping is on, Google Photos may also include photos in a particular group based on other characteristics. This includes photos being taken close together in time and detecting that a person is wearing the same clothing across photos when a face is not visible.

Face groups, face labels and sharing

• By default, face groups and labels in your account are only visible to you.
• Face groups are not shared when you share photos.
• Face labels are private to each account and not shared across accounts.
• You can choose to label a face group as 'Me'. This will help your contacts’ Google Photos apps recognise your face in photos and get suggestions to share photos of you with you. Learn how to label your face group.

When face grouping is on, you let us know that you want us to make models of the faces appearing in your photos. These models may be considered biometric data in some jurisdictions.

To delete your face models, turn off face grouping. We will store and use your face models, face groups and face labels until you either delete them or your Google Photos account is inactive for more than two years. Learn about Google Photos’ face grouping retention policy.

Remove, change or add people and pet labels to your photos

If Google Photos misses or incorrectly groups a photo, you can change, remove or add a photo to a face group.

This feature isn’t available in all countries.

Change which face group a photo belongs to

You can add, remove or change a face label when Google Photos labels the wrong person or pet.

1. On your computer, go to photos.google.com.
2. Select a photo.
3. Click Info .
4. Scroll to 'People' and click Edit .
5. Remove, add or change a label:
   • To remove a label: On the face label, click Remove .
   • To add a label: Under 'Available to add', click Add  on the face label. Then, in the photo, click a label to add, or select Add  to create a new label. 
   • To change a label:
     1. On the face label, click Remove .
     2. Under 'Available to add', on the face label, click Add .
     3. Select a face label to add.
6. Click Done.

Related page

Can't find your photos? Get help with finding photos.