The process of restoring damaged photos to their original state is known as photo restoration. Among these are repairing blurred, faded, and grainy images, sharpening the image, recovering color from black-and-white photos, removing dust spots, and fixing stains and scratches. As far as image retouching and restoring are concerned, it is generally possible to do it using a number of services, which can be selected based on your or your company’s needs and requirements.
Your photos are precious to you, and sometimes the digital age has caught up with them, missing important parts of the photo that you would like to restore. Luckily, there are many tools out there to help with old photo restoration using AI and online programs. We’ve compiled a list of ten interesting online photo restoration tools below.
If you’re looking for info about how to repair a Photoshop PSD file, you can also use a tool and online service for repairing corrupted Adobe Photoshop drawing projects and files but for this article, let’s proceed with some options on editing rather than recovering files.
10 online photo restoration tools in comparison
Taking good care of your photos is a great way to preserve memories and keep them safe for generations to come. Whether you have a few thousand photos or millions, these free online photo restoration tools can help you clean up the photos and restore them, so they look better than ever.
1. HitPaw Online Photo Retoucher
The photo touchup online tool from HitPaw is easy to use and has a very user-friendly interface. You only have to load their site up and it takes only a few clicks from uploading your source photo to getting your artificially enhanced image as a download. They have a free version to use as a test but I would suggest trying out one of the paid tiers if you want to process more than a single file or regularly.
Pros:
- Remove objects from a photo in a quick easy step
- No app download is needed
- Supports files of up to 20 MB even in the free tier
Cons:
- The resolution of free-tier photos might not be sufficient for print
- Some free options will have a watermark on the edited photo
2. AVCLabs AI photo enhancer and image upscale tool
The AVCLabs Photo Enhancer AI is a browser application that helps you to improve the quality of your photos. It uses machine learning to analyze your photos and then give you recommendations on how to improve them. If you want to quickly enhance old photos or upscale low-resolution photos, this app is for you.
The app is designed to be very easy to use. Just upload a photo and let the AI do its job. In most cases, you will see a significant improvement in the quality of your photo. The app is also constantly learning, so it gets better over time.
Pros:
- AI enhancer does the work for you
- Also helps to remove image backgrounds
- Image upscaling AI lets users increase the resolution of images without losing quality
Cons:
- Results are slightly worse in comparison to doing the fixes yourself or hiring someone for it
- No integrations into other tools or cloud storage
- Maybe not the cheapest solution on the market
3. Phowd
PHOWD is an easy-to-use tool that not only applies filters to your photos but also attempts to digitally restore them using AI technology. It’s a bit glitchy and not entirely reliable, but if you give it a try, you might end up with some decent results for your older photos.
Be sure to check out their video tutorial for more info. You can choose between 20 different photo restoration types. In addition to traditional remove spots/scratches restorations, there are also options like adding background detail or increasing sharpness.
The AI scans your photo automatically to decide which one of these options is well-suited for it; at first glance, there seems to be no way to force specific photo edits—so keep that in mind before you start playing around with anything important.
Pros:
- Good for image retouching
- Free online
Cons:
- Focus on image quality only
4. COLORIZER
This is a photo restoration tool that allows you to restore your image in less than five minutes and with minimal effort. All you need to do is upload your photo, and Image Colorizer will do everything else automatically. Even if your picture has experienced extreme damage, such as water stains or cracks, you can get it back to its original glory using Image Colorizer’s AI-powered restoration features.
Pros:
- Good for removing scratches
Cons:
- Paid
- Required login to edit photos
5. Image Restoration Center
This website allows you to restore your photos in 3 easy steps. It’s very user-friendly, and they provide a free demo if you want to try it out first. It’s free to use if your photo is less than 2MB, but if not, there is a small fee of $1 per file. Keep in mind that their website cannot fix extremely damaged photos with large cracks or missing pieces. For those cases, check out some of their competitors on our list below.
Pros:
- Easily colorize black & white photos
- Repairs photos with great detailing
Cons:
- Paid
- High pricing
6. Hotpot
Using Hotpot AI, pictures can be automatically repaired by removing scratches, enhancing their faces, and sharpening their colors. Professionals used to spend hours on this task, but now it can be completed in seconds.
In addition to color photographs, black & white photographs are also repaired. Although this service automates the process of photo restoration, it cannot replace an expert for complex services. The tool is designed to help consumers meet their lightweight needs and help professionals save time on difficult restoration requests.
Pros:
- Take seconds to restore photos
- Only for simple changes
- Various photo editing options are available
Cons:
- Need to update the tool with the latest features
7. Wondershare Fotophire Editing
With Wondershare’s Photo Eraser, you can take out unwanted objects in a photo, such as stains and power lines. With only a few clicks, your unwanted elements will be gone.
What is more? The program offers detailed settings for brush size, angle, and distance to ensure that the retouching process goes smoothly without a glitch. Just choose what area you want to remove with an easy-to-use eraser or color selection tool. You won’t even have to know how to use Photoshop.
Pros:
- Professional editing in a few clicks
- Various features available
Cons:
- Detailed features available in the paid version
8. Skylum
Skylum Luminar is a powerful photo editing software that helps you bring out hidden details in your photos and makes it easy to create stunning portraits.
It’s great for anyone who wants powerful photo-editing capabilities without too much complexity. Lightroom users will find Luminar’s architecture familiar—much of its interface is similar to Lightroom—so it’s easy to master once you get used to it.
Pros:
- Available free
- Gives great styling in only 12 seconds
- Good for newbies
Cons:
- Premium features available in the paid version
9. Photomyne
Photomyne is a photo restoration tool that uses AI (artificial intelligence) to bring old photos back to life. It’s essentially an app for photo restoration that you can use to restore old, torn, and faded pictures with ease.
Photomyne has multiple preset filters that can be used to improve your photos. Additionally, you can manually adjust your filter settings and experiment with different presets until you get exactly what you want out of your picture.
Pros:
- A useful tool with Artificial Intelligence
- Easily turn old photos into new ones
- Takes less than 10 seconds to scan the photo
Cons:
- Photos get branded in the free version
10. MyHeritage
Using artificial intelligence, MyHeritage can restore old family photos to their original color. Upon uploading, this website applies technology to determine if you have a black and white (or sepia) photo or a color photo. It would be colorized if the photo is black and white, and it will be restored to its original colors if it was taken in color. You must sign up for free in order to edit photos properly. In order to protect your privacy, uploaded photos will be automatically deleted.
Pros:
- Simple & Easy to use
- Uses deep learning technology
Cons:
- Required signup for photo editing
- Need to improve quality
These were ten useful and free online photo restoration tools that we have listed above. Check out our other article on the top 15 photo colonizers if you have any black and white photos you want to colorize. Go ahead, read on, and turn those black and white photos into beautiful colored ones.
Conclusion
Technology has come a long way since the advent of digital photography. However, many people still find it difficult to deal with their old photos and images due to their poor quality. With the help of AI, modern photo restoration tools can work wonders in this regard. In order to get the good possible results, you should first try different programs out there before settling on a particular one.
Photo credit: The feature image has been done by Romeo Soroka.
