Google Photos is getting its own version of Spotify Wrapped (Update: Official)

Update, December 6, 2024 (10:54 AM ET): Google has now officially announced its 2024 Recap for Photos.

Thanks to Google, we now have a few more details about how Recaps work. For instance, we saw that there was an optional Gemini-enhanced version of Recap available for users in the US. Google now explains that this will use Gemini to generate captions highlighting the pics Recap identifies as coming from one of your two biggest moments of the year.

Once you get your Google Photos Recap, it will continue to remain accessible through the app’s Memories carousel throughout December. If you’re still feeling nostalgic a little later on, you can always come back and check out your 2024 Recap even once the calendar rolls over to 2025 — you’ll just find it in your photo grid then.

Be on the lookout for a notification when Photos is ready to share your 2024 Recap with you.

Original article, December 6, 2024 (05:43 AM ET): Ever since its launch in 2015, Google Photos has been one of the premier photo sharing and backup services out there. Its early popularity can be largely attributed to the fact that it used to offer unlimited free storage for photos and videos, but even after that perk disappeared, the service remains incredibly popular, even amongst power users. Many of you probably have hundreds if not thousands of photos and videos stored in Google Photos, making it hard to find key moments unless you proactively organize your gallery. Fortunately, Google Photos is rolling out a new feature that generates a Recap of the photos and videos you’ve taken in 2024, so you don’t have to scroll through your entire gallery.

One of Google Photos’ key features is Memories (soon to be rebranded as Moments). The tool uses AI to scan your gallery and automatically compile similar photos and videos into collections placed at the top of the Photos tab. These AI-generated collections help differentiate Google Photos from other gallery apps for Android that simply display your photos in reverse chronological order and require you to organize them into albums yourself.

Google has experimented with various auto-generated collections since the Memories feature was introduced a few years ago. Today, tipster Kutlay Kızıl informed us that the Google Photos app had a new set of Memories for him. These Memories were titled “Longest streak 2024,” “Year in smiles 2024,” and “Your top faces 2024.”

Our tipster shared screen recordings of each Memory, but due to the highly personal nature of the photos within them, we can’t share the recordings in their entirety. However, we took some screencaps that showcase what one of these Memories is like. One of the Memories we saw summarized the “vibes” of the photos that Kızıl took this year.

There appear to be a total of five Memories related to this 2024 Recap feature in Google Photos. In addition to the one about “vibes,” there’s also one summarizing “your most snapped colors this year,” who appeared in your photos the most this year, which person you were pictured to be smiling with the most this year, and your longest streak of photos this year.

• Your 2024 vibes: Reveals your top 3 personas.
  • “What do your photos say about you in 2024? Your vibes have been all about…”
• Year in color: Shows your color palette of the year.
  • “What a colorful year! Your most snapped colors this year were…”
• Your top faces: Highlights your “All star cast” from this year.
  • “2024 featured an all-star cast! Your top faces were…”
• Year in smiles: Highlights the total number of smiles captured and who they smiled most with.
  • “This year, you captured X smiles. But you smiled the most with…”
• Longest streak: Highlights your longest photo streak of the year.
  • “How many days in a row did you snap a pic? Your longest streak in 2024: X days.”

To receive a Recap, you need to have the Face Groups feature turned on and should have taken enough photos throughout the year.

Google says that you can also opt-in (invite-only) to Gemini features in Google Photos to get an enhanced Recap experience. The Gemini-enhanced Recap is available to adults in the US who have the invite for Gemini-powered memories and have Face Groups and estimated locations turned on.

Since it’s now December, it’s no surprise to see Google test such a feature in the Photos app. Spotify Wrapped 2024 just went live, after all, so it’s that time of the year when every online service rolls out its own version of Wrapped. This kind of feature makes a lot of sense for a service like Google Photos, though, so we’re surprised that Google hasn’t done it before.

If you see these 2024 Recap collections in the Google Photos app, let us know in the comments below!