Google appears to be preparing a substantial upgrade for the markup tools inside Google Photos, with adjustable brush sizing, a broader color palette and more capable text controls currently in development. The unreleased changes were uncovered by app investigator AssembleDebug, who shared screenshots of the redesigned interface on September 10. Google has not announced the new markup experience, so there is no guarantee that every feature shown in development will reach the public app.
The existing Google Photos markup interface is comparatively simple. Google’s current support documentation lists Pen, Highlighter and Text as the primary markup options, with users able to draw, highlight portions of an image and place text over a photo. While text can be dragged around an image, the public tools offer considerably fewer customization options than the interface uncovered in the latest investigation.
One of the most noticeable additions is control over brush size. The in-development interface introduces sizing adjustments for drawing tools rather than limiting users to a largely fixed stroke, which would make it easier to switch between fine annotations and larger markings. An expanded selection of colors is also visible, giving users more flexibility than the relatively small palette associated with the current markup experience.
Text editing appears to be receiving a broader overhaul as well. The screenshots shared by AssembleDebug show additional controls intended to provide more flexibility over how text appears on an image, moving the feature closer to the editing interfaces found in dedicated social and image-editing apps. That would make Google Photos’ built-in editor more useful for adding captions, labels and quick annotations without sending an image to another application.
The changes fit into Google’s wider effort to modernize the Photos editor. Google has already introduced a redesigned editing interface on Android with reorganized categories and easier access to tools, while app investigations have repeatedly uncovered additional features before their public launches. More recently, AssembleDebug demonstrated an unreleased Redact tool in Google Photos that offers different ways to obscure sensitive areas of an image, including mosaic and blur effects with an adjustable brush.
Markup itself has remained relatively basic despite those broader editing improvements. Google moved the feature into a more prominent position within Photos years ago, but its core Pen, Highlighter and Text functionality changed relatively little compared with the app’s increasingly sophisticated photography tools. Adjustable drawing controls and richer text customization would therefore address one of the more obvious gaps between Google’s quick annotation features and the rest of its editor.
The potential upgrade could be particularly useful for screenshots and images that need simple explanatory edits. Users currently relying on separate applications for tasks such as drawing precise arrows, adding more visible labels or marking particular areas could perform more of that work without leaving Google Photos. It would not turn Photos into a full illustration or graphic-design application, but it could make its markup feature considerably more practical for everyday edits.
There is currently no confirmed rollout date for the redesigned markup tools. Features discovered through app teardowns or manually enabled development interfaces can change significantly before release, and Google sometimes tests functionality that never becomes widely available. The screenshots nevertheless show that the company is actively developing a more capable version of the feature rather than merely making cosmetic adjustments to the existing interface.
If the changes ship in their current form, Google Photos users would gain more control over three of the markup system’s most basic elements: stroke thickness, color selection and text presentation. Those additions would represent a meaningful expansion of a feature that has historically been designed around quick, minimal annotations. Until Google formally announces the update, however, the redesigned tools should be treated as work in progress rather than confirmed upcoming functionality.
