Photo standby shows non-iPhone photos with extremely low resolution

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Level 1

5 points

Photo standby shows non-iPhone photos with extremely low resolution

I have a lot of images I’ve taken with a DSLR, Mirrorless and Go Pro that are a lot better than the photos I’ve taken on my iPhone, so I’ve saved them to my phone, added them to an album and set them as my standby.

These photos show up in the standby as extremely low resolution. This is also the case when they appear on the ‘featured’ rotation in the standby.

I’ve attached screenshots of the Standby with an Image taken by a DLSR and. I cannot upload the original DLSR image as it’s above 5 MB, but I’ve taken a screenshot of it in Photos which still illustrates the low quality in the standby.

Nikon D800, 19 MP

Screenshot of above image in Photos (due to zoomed to fill image being above 5 MB, this was taken zoomed to fit, then cropped, which reduces quality further)

I can’t add a screenshot of the iPhone image on the standby, as the screenshot is 17 MB, despite the original being 4 MB.

Has anyone else experienced this and can offer a fix. I’m pretty let down that I can’t use any of my ‘nice’ images for the standby.

iPhone 16 Pro Max, iOS 18

Posted on Feb 22, 2025 12:19 AM

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Answer 1

Feb 22, 2025 1:03 AM in response to Dan1235

If your DSLR shots are in RAW, TIFF, or something else, convert them to JPEG or HEIC before adding them to your album on your iPhone.

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Answer 2

Dan1235 Author

Level 1

5 points

Feb 22, 2025 1:13 AM in response to SravanKrA

They’re JPEG, 300 DPI.

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Answer 3

Dan1235 Author

Level 1

5 points

Feb 22, 2025 6:57 AM in response to Jeff Donald

I probably should’ve put that together about DPI I while ago. The example image is approx 5400 x 3600. Here’s a screenshot of the metadata from Photos.

Standby is a feature on some iPhones (I have the 16 Pro Max, I’m not sure which); when the phone is charging and horizontal, the phone will display the time and other things such as calendar or reminders. One option is to display an album of photos (first picture in my original post).

I’ve made an album of my images from my D800, mirrorless and Go Pro. They are all at least 3000 x 2000 and are all landscape.

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Answer 4

Jeff Donald

Level 8

41,706 points

Feb 22, 2025 6:32 AM in response to Dan1235

Hi, not sure what you mean by photo standby. Is that something in the Photos app?

The 300 DPI is irrelevant for images used by screens. DPI is only relevant printing. The print is comprised of dots and the number of dots in an inch is a factor in print quality. This is because the size of the print can vary because of paper size changes.

A screen cannot change in size. The size and number of pixels is fixed or predetermined. What matters for screen images is the amount of compression and you stated 100% which is the maximum. The other factor is resolution. Resolution is determined by the height and width of the screen in pixels.

What is the height and width of the image you’re exporting from Lightroom?

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Answer 5

Dan1235 Author

Level 1

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Feb 22, 2025 9:17 AM in response to Jeff Donald

The same as the screenshot I sent. 5417 x 3615. The issue isn’t the resolution itself. You can see the difference in detail between the standby screenshot and the cropped screenshot of the image in photos.

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Answer 6

Dan1235 Author

Level 1

5 points

Feb 22, 2025 11:04 AM in response to Jeff Donald

Not really. It’s zooming to fit the image. If you check the first two images I sent in my original post, they are both zoomed to fill. The standby is noticeably lower quality compared to the screenshot of the image in photos. Zoom in and you will see how pixelated the standby is.

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