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Rikk Flohr-Retired
Adobe Employee
July 10, 2025
Question

Distraction Removal: Dust (Camera Raw and Lightroom Classic)

  • July 10, 2025
  • 391 replies
  • 28502 views

This post applies to Camera Raw and Lightroom Classic.

 

Dust Removal is no longer in Early Access status and can be found in the Remove edit panel for Camera Raw & Lightroom Classic. Dust Removal helps remove distracting spots in an image that may be caused by dust on a camera's sensor and is also effective on dust on the rear lens element.

 

Once enabled, your image will be scanned, and any detected dust spots will be automatically removed using Content-Aware Remove. For refinement, you can select one or multiple spots to delete or refresh. Batch removal is also supported; simply select the "Dust" checkbox under "Remove" in the copy settings dialog.

Please note that scanned negatives are not in the scope of this feature at this time. 

 

  • Dust spots on scans tend to be located in the focal plane, with the negative and very sharp, while sensor dust is typically positioned out of the focal plane and therefore not in focus.
  • Scanned negative dust typically appears as white spots on a darker background, whereas perceived sensor dust tends to appear as dark spots in lighter areas. 

 

We would love to hear your feedback on Dust Removal! Please give it a try and let us know what you think:
 

  • How is it useful?
  • How could it be more useful?
  • What could we do to improve your experience?

 

Lisa Ngo, Product Manager


Also see this video by @brianmatiash where he demos the feature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwpUX4b6igY 

 

Posted by:

391 replies

GChristopherPhotos
Participant
September 21, 2026

It just doesn’t work. I know for one it wasn’t created for those that archive photo slides 

Participant
September 21, 2026

When you copy the auto dust removal from one pic to another is does not recalculate and most spots remain. If I manually redo the calculation spots will be removed. Tool is removing roughly 90% of the spots.

stevethornton
Known Participant
September 20, 2026

I have sides that have VERY visible dust spots. The software tells me: “No dust spots found” - I tried 3 slides, very different subjects, lighting, it can’t find even 1 spot.

What am I missing?

Do I need to teach it, and if so what is the procedure? 

Participant
September 18, 2026

Tolles Tool arbeitet sehr zuverlässig

Participant
September 18, 2026

foto piena di polvere sotto forma di punti e fili neri, non individuata

Participant
September 17, 2026

It’s just OK on most jobs. It does a 85% job on sensor dust, but dist on a subject, it’s pretty much useless. I have an object on a black backdrop I had to shoot in an art gallery. The dust on the black plinth was terrible, but I was not allowed to touch the object, so I couldn’t clean the plinth. Dust removal found 1 piece of white dust on black among hundreds. 
I had high hopes for this tool… I just hope it improves soon. It will be a massive time saver, especially across multiple images on a commercial shoot. 

 

Participant
September 13, 2026

Argazki batzuetan ez dago aktibo aukera hau. Zergaitik izan daiteke?

Participant
September 10, 2026

Useless, miss almost all bigger spots of dust. It should be similar to dust and scratches filter, but assisted with AI so it removes dust better without blurring the details, maybe AI could make the mask so it only removes the dust?

Participant
September 9, 2026

Needs work. Not reliable. Misses obvious spots and syncing the images to remove visible dust is not great either. Looking forward to the improved version. 

Participant
September 8, 2026

consistently returns “Dust not Dectected” on images with apparent, removeable dust.  not useful at all.