Can you use AI to edit photos?

Cleaning up your own pictures with AI, like fixing a faded holiday snap or bringing back a scratched print of your grandparents, is fine. The catches come when the photo belongs to someone else, when it ends up in an advert, when the edit looks real and gets shared publicly, or when it is going on an official document.

The “belongs to someone else” part is where people trip up first, and it is less obvious than it sounds. Photographs are generally protected by copyright as artistic works, and you usually need the copyright owner’s permission to copy them or share them online. The creator is generally the first owner. Images first made on film are covered, and so are digital images created from them.

Here is the part that surprises people. A photo a relative took at a recent family event? To use it online you would need the creator’s permission, which means the relative who took it. If a freelance photographer was commissioned, they usually own the copyright unless you agreed otherwise. Photos taken before 1989 can follow different rules, so that box of old prints is not quite as simple as it looks.

Copyright in artistic work usually lasts 70 years after the author’s death, though the length also depends on how long ago the work was created. For older works, the IPO Customer Support Centre (0300 300 2000) can answer questions.

Then there is the AI angle. The government’s Report on Copyright and AI (March 2026) says that if you put a work you did not create into photo-editing software with AI functions, you need the relevant permissions to use it, including to make copies. The software does not change the rules.

How to do it well

Restoring old photos is where AI earns its keep, and also where it is easiest to get carried away. Start with the boring bit: scan the original at a high resolution and keep that untouched scan. Do not edit it or overwrite it. It is your safety net.

Then restore in steps rather than hitting one magic button and hoping:

1. Dust and scratches.
2. Tears and creases.
3. Colour fading.
4. Colourisation, only if you want it.

Doing it in that order means you can see what each stage changed, and stop when it looks right.

Check faces closely. AI can invent features, so a restored face might look sharper while quietly becoming a slightly different person. Colourisation is a guess too. The dress might not have been blue; the tool fills in what seems plausible.

Which leads to labelling. When you share restored and colourised versions with family or archives, mark them as restored or colourised. Otherwise, in thirty years, somebody treats a guessed colour as historical fact.

Before uploading anything, check the tool’s privacy terms, especially for photos of people. You are handing over images of real faces, so it is worth knowing what happens to them.

For business images the habit is the same with an extra rule: keep your originals, and do not exaggerate a product’s effect.

Rules and risks

Adverts. The ASA, the advertising regulator, does not see filters in ads as inherently problematic. But filters directly relevant to the product, like skin tone in an ad for a tanning product, that exaggerate the effect are misleading. In 2021 the ASA ruled against Skinny Tan and We Are Luxe influencer ads for exactly this reason. Minimal airbrushing is likely acceptable if it does not imply the claimed effect is achievable. The responsibility sits with the advertiser, who must hold evidence that visual claims are not misleading.

Platforms. YouTube says minor edits do not need disclosing: beauty filters, colour and lighting, sharpening, upscaling or repair. Realistic AI content that makes a real person appear to do something they did not, or that alters footage of a real event, must be disclosed. The test is whether a viewer would be misled about something real.

Official documents. Passport photos must be unaltered by computer software, so no AI tidy-ups at all. The passport photo page has the detail.

Metadata and moral rights. The IPO says deliberately removing metadata that identifies the copyright owner is unlawful, so think twice about what you are wiping from someone else’s file. Creators also have moral rights, including the right to object to derogatory treatment of their work.

Deepfakes. Sexually explicit or intimate deepfakes of real people are criminal in England and Wales: creating a purported intimate image of an adult without consent is an offence under section 66E of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (in force since February 2026), and sharing one is an offence under section 66B.

Your own photos and your own restorations: go ahead. Someone else’s photos, a product advert, a realistic edit going public, or a passport: slow down and check first.

This is general information, not legal advice.