OnePlus Launches New AI Photo Editing Tool, Following Google and Samsung’s Footsteps

OnePlus is jumping on the AI bandwagon. The Android phone-maker on Wednesday announced AI Eraser, a new tool for erasing unwanted objects in photos. The launch comes after Google and Samsung have introduced similar AI-powered editing tools for their respective Google Pixel and Samsung Galaxy devices.

AI Eraser can remove objects from photos and generate a replacement background to blend in with the rest of the image. It’ll be available on the OnePlus 12, OnePlus 12R, OnePlus 11, OnePlus Open and OnePlus Nord CE 4 starting this month. The company says it uses its own proprietary model to power AI Eraser and plans to introduce more AI features later this year.

Read more: The iPhone May Get a Big Dose of AI This Year

Until now, OnePlus was one of the only smartphone-makers not pushing generative AI as a main selling point — a stance that my colleague Andrew Lanxon called “refreshing” in his OnePlus 12 review. The company’s biggest competitors, namely Samsung and Google, have been going all-in on generative AI and other AI-fueled tools.

Watch this: OnePlus 12 Review: A Flagship Phone That’s Almost Perfect

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Samsung, for example, introduced a suite of features on the Galaxy S24 series called Galaxy AI, which it recently began rolling out to select other Galaxy devices. Among those features is Generative Edit, a tool that similarly uses AI to delete or move objects in a photo and refill the leftover space. Before that, Google introduced Magic Editor on the Pixel 8 and 8 Pro, which is also designed for removing, relocating or resizing elements in a photo. Google’s Magic Eraser tool was introduced years ago on the Pixel 6, but has been made available as a cloud-based tool for Google One subscribers. 

OnePlus’ announcement is yet another sign that generative AI is poised to play a larger role in upcoming smartphones. Apple is expected to announce new AI-based features as part of its next major iPhone update, presumably called iOS 18, according to Bloomberg. Market research firm IDC also expects we’ll see a surge in phones equipped to handle AI computing. It predicts that 170 million so-called “next-gen AI” smartphones will be shipped in 2024, compared to 51 million in 2023. 

Editors’ note: CNET is using an AI engine to help create some stories. For more, see this post.