For most of us, our iPhones are the only cameras we need and own. Our phones are flooding with photos at any given moment. No, not just photos – memories. We simply don’t make memories in our lives anymore, we capture them too.

And with the Memories feature in Photos, our iPhones can make those memories a proper montage that’s fit for them. Here’s how to use memories in iPhone.

What are Memories on iPhone?

iPhone curates memories on your iPhones after recognizing significant people, places, and events in your library. It then presents them in a montage after applying photographic looks and corresponding songs to the memory. You can view and share these memories with your friends and family. You can also use the memory slideshow in the Photos widget on your Home screen.

iPhone chooses the photos, songs and looks for the memories all on its own but you can change everything. You can also create your memories from scratch. When you create a memory, the only task you have to undertake is selecting the photos or videos you want to be a part of the memory (if creating from an album). You don’t have to do the rest of the hard work. The Photos app will put together the montage on its own.

Editing Pre-Made Memories on iPhone

Open the Photos app on your iPhone. Go to the ‘For You’ tab from the bottom of the screen.

At the top, you’ll see the Memories curated by the iPhone for you. Tap ‘See All’ to see all the memories curated by your iPhone.

Tap a Memory to play it.

To bring up the options, tap the memory again. A few options would appear on the screen.

You can see the photos or videos in the memory at the bottom. Tap ‘Browse’ at the bottom right to see all the photos or videos in the memory.

When you tap Browse, the memory will continue to play if you haven’t paused it while you can browse through all the photos.

You can hold and tap a photo to bring up options like removing the photo from the memory, deleting it altogether from the library, making it the key photo, among others. If you simply tap a photo, you’ll return to that photo being played in the memory slideshow.

Change the Memory Mix

To change the memory mix, i.e., the song or the photographic look, tap the ‘Memory mix’ icon on the bottom left.

In addition to the current song and photographic look (i.e., filter), iPhone will also present a few more combinations of songs and photographic looks. Swipe through them to preview them. You can see the name of the song and the filter at the bottom. To select one, simply tap the memory frame and you’ll return to the slideshow screen with now choices in effect.

Other than the curated combinations that iPhone offers, users can also change the memory look (filter) and those on iOS 15 can also change the music. If you’re an Apple Music subscriber, you can choose any song from your library, suggested songs based on your preferences, songs played at the time when the memory was made, or search the entire Apple Music catalog available in your region.

To change the memory look, tap the ‘Filters’ button at the bottom right corner.

Select the new filter and tap ‘Done’.

To change the memory music, tap the ‘Music’ button.

Select a song from the suggestions on your screen or search for a song. Tap the song to select it; it’ll start playing. If you don’t want to choose it, tap ‘Cancel’ and choose another song. Otherwise, tap ‘Done’.

Manually Creating a Memory on Your iPhone

While figuring out that you can edit pre-made memories is a little tricky on its own, further knowing how to create them from scratch is even dicier. Not many users even know that they have such an option at their disposal. But once you do get to know the process, the entire process turns out to be rather easy.

You can choose to create a memory from different places. You can either create a memory from:

  • An album
  • A day or Month from the library tab. The option isn’t available for the Years photos.
  • People’s album

Creating a Memory from an Album or Day/ Month

The process for creating a memory from an album or a day or month is the same. If the photos don’t belong in a single album or day/ month section, you can simply create a new album with the photos in question.

Go to the album or day/ month from the library and tap the ‘More’ icon (three-dot menu) in the top-right corner.

From the menu, tap the option ‘Play Memory Movie’.

The iPhone will create a memory slideshow for the photos in the album or the day/ month by curating a song and photographic look on its own. Similar to pre-made memories, you can edit the memory mix. There will be a few curated combinations of music and filter which you can choose. Or you can select everything from music and filter on your own.

If you want to save the memory, tap the screen to bring up options. Then, tap the ‘More’ option (three-dot menu) in the top-right corner of the screen. Tap ‘Add to Favorites’ from the menu. The memory will appear in the Memories section of the ‘For You’ tab.

Tap the ‘Close’ (X) button to close the memory.

Creating a Memory for a Person

To create a memory for a person, go to the ‘Albums’ tab.

Then, go to the ‘People’ album.

Tap the thumbnail for the person. Their photos will open. Tap the ‘More’ button (three-dot menu) in the upper-right corner.

Finally, tap ‘Create Photo Memory’.

The memory slideshow will appear in the Memories section of the ‘For You’ tab. Go there to view it. You can edit it just like any other memory on your iPhone.

Editing a Memory

Whether it’s a pre-made memory or a memory you created, you can edit certain aspects of the memory. You can change its name and length as well as add and remove photos. Of course, the options vary depending on the type of memory.

Changing the Title

iPhone names your memories randomly, sometimes according to the location, day, album or person’s name, or any context it can see, like “Celebration.” But you can change the name. To edit the name of the memory, open the memory and tap it to bring up options. Tap the ‘More’ button (three-dot menu) in the upper-right corner.

Select ‘Edit Title’ from the menu.

Change the name and tap ‘Save’.

Adding or Removing Photos

To add or remove photos, tap ‘More’ and select ‘Manage Photos’ from the menu.

Select or deselect the photos you want to add or delete. Tap ‘Done’.

Note: When you’ve made a memory from an album, you cannot add any more photos to it after you’ve made the memory. Even when you make the memory for a person or a day/ month, you can only add more photos from photos available for that particular person or day/month. The same goes for memories that the iPhone makes on its own. The only photos available are for that place or event that the Photos app associates with that memory and some photos don’t make the cut.

To make another photo the key photo instead of the current picture, pause the memory on the photo. Tap ‘More’ and select ‘Make Key Photo’ from the menu.

Change the Length

For pre-made memories, you can also edit their length. The option isn’t available for the memories you make as their length is “Custom”. But for the memories that iPhone made, tap ‘More’.

There, you’ll most likely see the three options: ‘Short’, ‘Medium’ and ‘Long’. Tap the option you want to. For some memories, you might only see ‘Short’ and ‘Medium’ depending on the number of photos you have for them.

Memories in iPhone are a great way to reminisce about some great times in your life. You can even easily share them with friends and family. And the lack of effort that goes into making them makes them a great hit.