Introducing Assisted Culling (Early Access) in Lightroom Desktop For providing feedback for Lightroom Classic, click here. TL;DR – Assisted Culling is getting faster, more powerful, and more accurate as we head to GA. If you tried in October 2025, we urge you to try the new version and give us feedback – especially for wedding & portrait photographers. We’re eager to hear your feedback! Assisted Culling has received several updates since Early Access launched in October 2025. If you tried it then, here's what's new: April 2026 Significantly improved handling of shallow depth-of-field for photos – a major customer ask. Images with intentional background blur are now more reliably recognized and kept rather than rejected as out-of-focus. We’ve retrained the “Reject model” so it has more accurate identification of reject-worthy images. Additionally, an image can now be flagged under multiple reject reasons simultaneously: Exposure Issues: includes a sensitivity slider so you can control the threshold Documents Misfires: ground shots and severe blur Culling scores no longer recalculate when you switch preview sizes (e.g., grid view to detail view). February 2026 Expanded support from individual portraits to multi-person scenes, including weddings, events, and group photos. Improved eye detection accuracy in dense group and wedding scenes Cleaner subject separation when multiple people are close together Fewer false "eyes closed" results on groups and portraits FAQs: Q: Where is Assisted Culling available? A: Lightroom Desktop and Lightroom Classic. Q: What kinds of photos work best today? A: Individual portraits and multi-person scenes, including weddings, events, and group photos. Q: Can I adjust how strict the culling is? A: Yes. Each criterion can be toggled on or off, and Subject Focus, Eye Focus, and Exposure Issues include sensitivity sliders for finer control. Q: Do I need to pay extra? A: No. Assisted Culling is included in your existing Lightroom subscription. Feedback Please share your experience in this thread. Include: App version/platform System details Example images (optional) Kwamina Arthur, Product Manager, Lightroom

Rikk Flohr_Photography

Question

(Early Access) Assisted Culling (Lightroom Ecosystem - Desktop)

Forum|Forum|7 months ago
September 24, 2025
77 replies
8195 views

Introducing Assisted Culling (Early Access) in Lightroom Desktop

For providing feedback for Lightroom Classic, click here.

TL;DR – Assisted Culling is getting faster, more powerful, and more accurate as we head to GA. If you tried in October 2025, we urge you to try the new version and give us feedback – especially for wedding & portrait photographers. We’re eager to hear your feedback!

Assisted Culling has received several updates since Early Access launched in October 2025. If you tried it then, here's what's new:

April 2026

Significantly improved handling of shallow depth-of-field for photos – a major customer ask. Images with intentional background blur are now more reliably recognized and kept rather than rejected as out-of-focus.

We’ve retrained the “Reject model” so it has more accurate identification of reject-worthy images. Additionally, an image can now be flagged under multiple reject reasons simultaneously:

Exposure Issues: includes a sensitivity slider so you can control the threshold

Documents

Misfires: ground shots and severe blur

Culling scores no longer recalculate when you switch preview sizes (e.g., grid view to detail view).

February 2026

Expanded support from individual portraits to multi-person scenes, including weddings, events, and group photos.

Improved eye detection accuracy in dense group and wedding scenes

Cleaner subject separation when multiple people are close together

Fewer false "eyes closed" results on groups and portraits

FAQs:

Q: Where is Assisted Culling available?
A: Lightroom Desktop and Lightroom Classic.

Q: What kinds of photos work best today?
A: Individual portraits and multi-person scenes, including weddings, events, and group photos.

Q: Can I adjust how strict the culling is?
A: Yes. Each criterion can be toggled on or off, and Subject Focus, Eye Focus, and Exposure Issues include sensitivity sliders for finer control.

Q: Do I need to pay extra?
A: No. Assisted Culling is included in your existing Lightroom subscription.

Feedback

Please share your experience in this thread. Include:

App version/platform
System details
Example images (optional)

Kwamina Arthur, Product Manager, Lightroom

Feedback

Show previous replies

J

jonahlevine

Participant

I would love the ability to set the point to look for focus accuracy. I am trying to get certain shots and it is detecting lack of focus on the wrong point

baqir4

Participant

It would be great if the model could understand different photos/frames and sort them into categories. For example, I do photos of aircraft and would love it if it could sort the interior from the exterior.

B

Birgit2464950518oo

Participant

Hi!

Would like to have eye (or head) focus selection also on animals. Being a nature photography the current culling is not very useful.

Train the AI more on animal and landscape photos.

ADRIANO_SILVA

Participant

The idea is excellent, but I believe that what's more important in the selection process is removing duplicate photos, photos that are similar. That would help much more than checking whether or not it was taken properly. That's my opinion.

TimoHotti

Participant

Does. Not. Work. For example, this one is a reject because it is blurry.

vonOstoya

Participant

Hi, how can I switch off AI? It’s a crap, destroying my work. thanks

J

jonahlevine

Participant

the only option for this function is ai

cwoz

Participant

would love to use it but all it does is crash my computer. wasted hours trying to get it to work

A

Albson

Participating Frequently

Amazing concept. I wish it had worked, but my results were very poor. I tried both culling and stacking and both were poor. It selected misfires and missed terrific shots. It picked many shots with eyes closed after selecting eyes open.

MFitts

Participant

Very cool concept. Most of my images were ‘rejected’ with the focus filter, despite the subject being tack sharp and shallow depth of field (sports photos). I also had it set to only ‘subject focus’ and one click above the midline.

Anne5CE9

Participant

I like the idea of automated culling but when I tried it on my large collection of pictures of clouds at sunset it wanted to cull a lot of lovely photos. I think the program needs work.

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