Darkroom has been around for over a decade now, which in "app years" is basically a lifetime. Honestly, if you’ve spent any time on the iOS App Store looking for a way to make your phone photos look less like a phone photo and more like something shot on a Leica, you’ve probably seen that dark-tiled icon. But here’s the thing: most people still treat it like a fancy version of Instagram’s built-in editor.
That is a mistake.
While everyone was obsessing over AI generators that turn your dog into a van Gogh painting, the team at Bergen Co. (the indie studio behind the app) was busy rebuilding the actual engine of mobile photography. In 2026, the Darkroom app isn't just about slapping a "moody" preset on a selfie. It’s become a full-blown mobile workstation that, frankly, makes Adobe Lightroom look a bit bloated and corporate.
The "No Import" Secret
If you’ve ever used Lightroom, you know the drill. You open the app, you wait for it to "import" your photos into its own internal library, and suddenly you have two versions of every photo taking up space on your phone. It’s annoying.
The Darkroom app doesn’t do that.
It lives right on top of your iCloud Photo Library. You open the app, and every photo you just took is already there. No waiting. No duplicating. If you delete a photo in Darkroom, it’s gone from your phone. If you edit a photo, those changes sync across your iPad and Mac immediately. It’s a deep integration with Apple’s ecosystem that most big-name developers just won’t—or can’t—do because they want to lock you into their own cloud storage.
Why 2026 is the Year of RAW (and AI Masks)
The big shift recently has been how the app handles RAW and ProRAW files. Mobile sensors are getting massive, and the data coming off an iPhone 16 or 17 Pro is huge.
Darkroom handles these files natively.
We’re talking about 16-bit color depth and a recovery range for highlights and shadows that feels almost impossible for a mobile app. But the real "magic" happens with their AI-powered masking.
What most people get wrong about Darkroom's AI
It’s not generative AI. It’s not going to add a mountain range where there wasn’t one. Instead, it uses machine learning to identify the "semantic" layers of your photo. With one tap, you can select just the sky. Another tap selects only the skin tones.
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- Portrait Masking: It identifies hair, skin, and teeth separately. You can brighten a smile without making the skin look like plastic.
- Atmospheric Depth: Because it reads the depth map from your phone’s camera, you can edit the background and foreground independently.
- Sky Detection: You can drop the exposure on a blown-out sky while keeping the landscape bright and punchy.
The interface is built for thumbs. No tiny sliders that require a stylus. You swipe, you tap, and you’re done.
The Video Editing Curveball
A lot of people don’t realize that the Darkroom app is now a top-tier video editor too. Well, sort of.
It’s not a "timeline" editor like Final Cut or LumaFusion. You aren't going to be cutting a feature film here. Instead, it treats video exactly like a photo. All those professional color grading tools—the Curves, the Selective Color, the 4K/8K export options—work on video in real-time.
If you have a video of a sunset that looks a bit washed out, you can apply your favorite photo preset to it. It’s non-destructive, meaning you can always go back to the original "flat" footage. For creators making Reels or TikToks who want a consistent "look" across their photos and videos, this is the gold standard.
Pricing: The "Forever" Option
Software subscriptions are exhausting. Everyone knows it.
Darkroom offers a $9.99 monthly sub and a $39.99 yearly one (Darkroom+), which is pretty standard. But they kept the "Forever" option. It’s $99.99. That sounds steep for an app, but in an era where everything is a "rented" service, owning your creative tools for life is a breath of fresh air.
"Darkroom is one of the best apps around, offering extensive support for RAW and ProRAW photos and capabilities to batch edit photos with ease." – The Verge
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Putting It Into Practice
If you're ready to stop just "filtering" and start actually editing, here is how you should approach the Darkroom app next time you open it:
- Cull First: Use the "Flag & Reject" system. Swipe up to flag, down to reject. It’s the fastest way to clean up a 200-photo session from your weekend trip.
- Master the Curves: Don't just use the brightness slider. Open the Curves tool. Pull the bottom-left corner up slightly to "fade" your blacks, and drop the middle a bit for that moody, cinematic contrast.
- Batch Everything: If you find a look you love, copy the edits. Select ten other photos and paste. It’ll process them all in the background while you keep working.
- Use the Histogram: If you're editing outside in the sun, your eyes will lie to you. Check the histogram in the top corner to make sure you aren't actually "clipping" your whites or losing all detail in the shadows.
The app isn't perfect—it's still iOS and Mac only, so Android users are out of luck—but for those in the Apple garden, it’s arguably the most "pro" feeling tool that still feels like it was made by people who actually enjoy taking pictures.
Stop using the "Auto" button. Open the Selective Color tool, pick the greens in your landscape, and shift the hue toward yellow. It’ll change your life. Or at least your Instagram feed.