The Camera Control button on the iPhone 16 and 16 Pro gives you a whole new way to take photos on iPhone, as well as the ability to fine-tune and customise photo settings on the fly within the Camera app. In this short QuickTip video, I’ll explain how it works and what you can use it for.

Firstly, we can press the Camera Control button once to open the Camera app no matter what we’re doing on iOS. That means it works if your phone is locked or even if you’re busy in another app—a quick press of the Camera Control will take you straight into the Camera app and let you grab a picture.

When you’re in the Camera, you can press firmly on the button again, and it will work as a shutter button to take that photo immediately. But the interesting thing with the Camera Control is that there are two ways you can press it—which I know sounds a little bit weird, but bear with me.

If you press it firmly, you’ll use it as a shutter and take your photo. But if you gently press it, almost like you’re half-pushing it in, you’ll see a menu like this appear underneath your finger. This Camera Control menu has two distinct levels: the top level has icons for different features, and the sub-menus have sliders and controls to adjust the particular setting you’re on.

Here you’ll see I’m adjusting the zoom just by swiping my finger up and down. At any point, you can jump up to the top level of the Camera Control by lightly tapping the button twice, almost like a double click. At this point, you’ll see a set of icons like this. From here, you can swipe to pick the setting you want to change, and then lightly tap once to jump into that setting and make changes.

I’ve now moved on to the Cameras option, which—like Zoom—lets you change which camera lens you’re shooting with. This will jump from the ultra-wide to the 1X, 2X, or 5X, rather than a continuous scroll like the Zoom option. This ensures you won’t accidentally use digital zoom (like a 4.8X zoom instead of 5X), instead relying on the optical zoom of your camera and lenses. Again, you can simply press the Camera Control button firmly to take a photo.

If you want to switch settings, gently double tap the button to go to the top-level menu. It takes a bit of getting used to, but remember: two taps let you go to the top level of the menu to pick a setting, and one tap lets you change the setting you’ve selected. You should be good to go—and always remember, one firm press takes the photo.

It’s certainly a lot of different functions packed into one button, but I love the idea of being able to easily control camera settings one-handed and then take a photo immediately. I’ll also quickly mention that you can change the sensitivity required to use this button. To do this, just open the Settings app, choose Accessibility, and then find Camera Control. From here, you can customise how sensitive the controls are when you’re inside the app, as well as how quickly it recognises a double tap.

And that’s the Camera Control button in a nutshell! But I’m not finished. If you want to learn more about your new iPhone 16—or just about your iPhone in general—please do check out and subscribe to my channel down below. There are hundreds of QuickTip videos just like this one to help you make the most of the device you already own by showing you lots of cool and hidden features and settings to make your iPhone more useful and more personal.

And if you want to see what’s new in iOS 18 this year, please check out my eBook down below. I’ll see you next time!