Golden hour is the short time after sunrise and before sunset when the sun sits low and its light turns warm, soft and golden. Faces glow on one side, the background warms up, and even a plain portrait looks calmer. This page gives a photo you already have that golden hour effect, whatever time of day you took it.
It opens Add light with the Golden hour look already picked: a low amber light in front of your subject on one side, a soft warm glow behind them, and a pale warm light over the whole photo. The light falls on the shape of the face and body, so the side turned towards the sun gets the most. It works like a one-tap sunset filter, except that you can drag the sun to where it should be.
What the golden hour look is made of
Low evening sun comes from one side, it is warmer than midday light, and it leaves the air behind a person glowing. The Golden hour look builds each of those from a separate part of the tool, so you can change one without losing the rest. The panel lists them: Overall for the whole photo, then one row per light.
| Part | Starts as | What it adds |
|---|---|---|
| Overall | A pale warm colour, below 100 % | Warms and dims the whole photo slightly, so the sunlight reads |
| Light 1 | Amber, low on the left, in front of the subject | The sun itself: the side of the face turned towards it lights up |
| Light 2 | A soft gold, high on the right, behind the subject | A warm glow on the background around the head |
| Depth | Light 1 in front, Light 2 in the hatched Behind part | Which light falls on the person and which only on the background |
Because the light follows the shape of your subject, a cheek, a shoulder or a fold of cloth turned towards the amber light brightens more than the parts turned away. That is what makes it read as a low sun rather than an orange layer laid over the picture.
This is a sunset effect on a photo you already have, not a new sky. It warms and lights what is there; it does not paint in clouds or remove the shadows already in the photo. It works best on photos of people. In a photo with no person and no clear subject, the light falls evenly on the whole picture.
Moving the sun and setting its strength
Where the sun sits decides where the light seems to come from. Drag Light 1's round handle on the picture to move it, or choose the light and tap the picture where it should go. Low and to one side gives the late evening look. The chosen light also shows a soft disc in its colour, which marks where its light reaches the background.
A light can sit a little outside the picture, so the sunlight seems to come from out of frame; its handle then stays on the nearest edge, where you can still grab it. With a handle focused, the arrow keys move its light by 1 % of the picture, or 5 % with Shift.
- Colour: pick a swatch, such as Amber, Orange or Warm white, or choose any colour you like.
- Strength, from 0 to 300 %: how bright the light is. The look starts the sun well above 100 %.
- Depth, from Behind to In front: where the light sits from front to back. The handle grows as the light comes forward.
- Reach, from Short to Long: how far the light carries before it fades to nothing.
Light 2, the glow behind, has the same controls in its own row. Its Depth sits in the hatched part of the slider, so it lights only the background and never the face. Drag it out of the hatched part and it starts to light your subject from the front instead.
Making it subtler or stronger
The golden hour effect is a starting point, and most photos need it nudged one way or the other. If it looks too orange, open Light 1 and pick a paler Colour, such as Warm white, or set the Overall Colour to White so the rest of the photo keeps its own colours. Doing both gives a soft late afternoon light rather than a deep sunset.
| If the photo looks | Try this |
|---|---|
| Too orange | Give Light 1 a paler Colour, or set the Overall Colour to White |
| Too dark away from the sun | Raise the Overall Strength towards 100 % |
| Washed out near the sun | Lower Light 1's Strength or Reach |
| No glow behind the person | Raise Light 2's Strength, and keep its Depth in the hatched part |
| Lit from the wrong side | Drag the sun across, or a little past the edge of the picture |
For a stronger golden hour filter, raise Light 1's Strength and lower the Overall Strength, which darkens the rest of the photo so the sunlight stands out. To spread warmth across a wide photo, press Add light and drag the new light low on the opposite side; a photo holds up to 6 lights. Switch a light off with the switch on its row to see the photo without it.
If you only want a photo slightly warmer, with no sun at all, Adjust image colour has a Warmth slider that runs from Cooler to Warmer and shifts the whole picture evenly. If the photo is too dark to begin with, brighten the photo first, then add the golden light to the brighter copy.
Saving the warmed photo
When the sunset effect on the photo looks right, press Download in the bar above the picture. The picture saves at once, at full size, in its own format: a JPG stays a JPG and a PNG stays a PNG, while an iPhone HEIC photo becomes a JPG, and a GIF, BMP, TIFF or ICO picture becomes a PNG. The new file's name ends in _light, so it sits beside your original.
Press Hide handles to see the clean result without the handles and the reach disc; the saved file never has them. A light you switched off is left out of the file, just as it is left out of the preview. The warmed copy is drawn fresh, so it carries no camera, date or location details.
- It works on one photo at a time. Press Replace for the next one: the lights and the look stay as you left them.
- As soon as you open a photo, a small copy of it goes to our server to work out its shape. The server holds it only in memory, deletes it as soon as the shape is sent back, and never stores or logs it.
- It is free, with no account and no watermark. On the Free plan our server works out the shape of up to 20 photos a day.
- It works in current Chrome, Edge and Firefox. Very large pictures may be too big for your browser.
The same tool holds every other look. Add light to image opens on Studio with Golden hour and the rest beside it, the neon light effect lights a face with magenta and cyan from either side, and the spotlight effect leaves one person lit and the rest in shadow.
Warm up your photo now
Select a photo above and the Golden hour look is on it as soon as its shape is back. Drag the sun into place, set its Strength, and press Download. The golden hour effect is free, with no account and no watermark.
