How to add titles and captions to your photos and videos on iPhone and Mac

Learn how to manually add titles and captions to images and videos in the Photos app on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac to make it easy to search for them later.

A hillside picture with title and Apple Photos app icon
Original image: Giulia Salvaterra for Unsplash

Most people don’t take the time to organize their photos, much less add details to them. But if you want to start, then one of the best ways is to include information about your photos. By doing so, you’ll be on your way to a more effective photo management.

Why add titles and captions to photos

Titles and descriptions can help you search more easily. If you enter a keyword into the search box, the Photos app will produce pictures and videos using that keyword in the title and description, as well as the date and location.

Furthermore, you’ll have a simpler way to recall the photos and videos. For instance, you can add a description of the photo that might not be obvious at first glance. This is especially helpful as years pass and you capture more and more personal pictures and videos.

Add a caption to a picture on iOS

  1. Open the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad and tap the photo you want to caption. This will put it in full view.
  2. Tap the information icon ⓘ or swipe up from the bottom of the screen.
  3. You’ll see the Add a Caption box field. Type in your caption and tap Done.
Adding a caption to a photo on iPhone

Add a title, caption, or description in Photos on Mac

1) Open the Photos app on your Mac and select a picture or video to start with.

2) With your photo or video selected, either right-click and pick Get Info or click the Info icon (small letter “i”) in the Photos toolbar.

3) A small window will appear with the metadata for that item. Click within the Add a Title section and type in the title you want to use. Then do the same with the Add a Description/Caption section.

4) When you finish, just use the X to close the details window.

Photos Add Title Description Mac

Searching with title or description

As mentioned, adding a title and/or description to your photos and videos can help when you want to find one in particular.

Use the Search box in the Apple Photos app, and enter a keyword that you used in either the title, caption, or description.

Photos will display your best results right at the top. But you’ll also see results based on where that keyword was found.

For example, in the screenshot below, you can see we searched for “hot,” and Photos showed us an image with that word in the title.

Photos Search Titles Mac

As another example, here we searched for “100,” and Photos showed us a photo with that keyword in the description.

Photos Search Descriptions Mac

While you probably won’t remember all of the titles and descriptions that you give to photos and videos over time, it’s likely you’ll have at least one keyword in mind to search with. And remember, you can tag your photos with keywords too.

Important: Your iPhone or Mac may take some time to index the titles and captions. So, you may not be able to find the image by the newly added title or description immediately after adding it.

Display photo titles on Mac

One other nice feature of adding titles in Photos is that you can see those displayed rather than the default file name.

Photos Show Title Mac

If you don’t see the titles or the filenames below your photos and videos, this is a simple setting.

Click View > Metadata and then click Titles. This will put a checkmark next to it, and you should then see your titles in Photos.

Photos View Metadata Titles Mac

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