New
- AI photo descriptions (Pro). On an analyzed photo, the Description field's Draft button writes a natural caption from what MetaScope actually recognizes, for example "A dog on a beach at sunset," and stages it for you to edit before saving. Generate AI Descriptions… captions a whole shoot in a batch, in four tones (Stock caption, Archival record, Social media, Fine art), with a per photo review list so you keep only the captions you want. Descriptions fold in the location, date, and camera from your metadata, can transcribe short visible text like a sign or a label, and note composition and an exact people count. On macOS 26 with Apple Intelligence, a caption can optionally be rewritten into more fluent prose, still on-device and still grounded to the facts, never inventing a person, place, or count that is not there.
- Smart keyword suggestions. Analyzed photos now offer curated, human-readable keyword suggestions, clearly badged so you know they came from image recognition, in keyword autocomplete and the Batch Keyword Editor. MetaScope recognizes well over a thousand specific subjects out of the box, from dog and cat breeds to dishes, plants, instruments, sports, and landmarks, plus pets and people. Everything stays suggest-only, so nothing is written until you accept. A new Auto-Keyword Folder… action reviews an entire folder's suggestions in a fast per photo accept or reject grid, and each suggestion shows a source glyph (Vision or Enhanced) and a 1 to 3 dot match-strength indicator.
- Enhanced Recognition (Pro, optional). Turn on a second, broader on-device model that catches subjects Apple's built-in recognizer misses, such as specific breeds, vehicles, and scene objects, each shown as an Enhanced chip and boosted when both models agree. It is bundled with the app, so it is fully offline with no download.
- On-device Image Analysis. A single Image Analysis toggle extracts text and scene labels from your photos entirely on your Mac, with no upload and no network, and backfills your Libraries with progress you can pause and resume (a pause that even survives quitting MetaScope). A More results / Balanced / Higher accuracy control gates each kind of subject by how reliable it actually is and applies instantly to photos you have already analyzed. Analyze or re-analyze a single photo right from the Info Panel, and clear all analysis data anytime.
- One-click metadata scenarios. Copy Metadata and Date Operations each gain a row of plain-language scenarios (Restore after an AI edit, Make all dates match, Fix a wrong camera clock, Read dates from filenames) that set up a real task in a single click, with the full manual controls still right below.
Improvements
- Metadata Search keeps itself fresh. Auto-indexed Libraries now refresh for Metadata Search while MetaScope is open, so search stays current as files change in Finder, with next-refresh, indexed-count, and external-drive status visible in Settings. Each Library shows how many items it has indexed and can be cleared on its own, and a new Remove Entries Outside Libraries… tidies up anything left behind by folders you no longer track.
- Background re-indexing of auto-indexed Libraries is now incremental, reprocessing only the files that actually changed instead of your whole library every cycle, which keeps idle CPU low.
- The Intelligence menu is now consistent everywhere. Right-click a file or a folder, in the browser or the sidebar, for the same Intelligence submenu.
- You can now write a description entirely by hand, alongside the AI Draft button.
- Favorites open faster and rapid clicks land where you expect.
- A photo you edit in Photos.app refreshes in the MetaScope grid without scrolling.
Fixes
- A large reliability pass across iCloud folders, TIFF thumbnails, RAW metadata writing, and search-index cleanup.
- AI descriptions no longer misread a scene attribute and no longer double the people count.
- Adding an iCloud folder no longer freezes the app, and the Browser sidebar tree no longer renders blank on first expand.
- Metadata writes for Description, Artist, Copyright, and Software are now read back and verified, multi-line fields save in full, and RAW field values persist correctly.
- Generate AI Descriptions and Auto-Keyword now explain when a folder is not in a Library instead of opening an empty window.
MetaScope 1.5.0 (Build 50)
July 2026, Build 50
MetaScope 1.5.0 is our biggest release yet. It brings on-device intelligence to your photo metadata: MetaScope can now look at your photos and help you describe and keyword them, writing natural-language descriptions and suggesting keywords for scenes, pets, people, and text, all running entirely on your Mac. No cloud, no network, and nothing is ever written until you review and confirm. Alongside the Intelligence work, Metadata Search’s Libraries model matured and a large reliability pass landed.
AI Photo Descriptions
On any analyzed photo, the Description field’s Draft button now writes a natural caption from what MetaScope actually recognizes, for example “A dog on a beach at sunset,” and stages it in the editor for you to edit before saving. Need to caption a whole shoot? Generate AI Descriptions… does it in a batch, in four tones (Stock caption, Archival record, Social media, and Fine art), and shows you every proposed caption in a review list, so you write only the ones you keep.
Descriptions get richer the more the photo tells us. They fold in the location, date, and camera from your metadata, can transcribe short visible text like a sign or a label, and note composition and an exact people count. On macOS 26 with Apple Intelligence, a caption can optionally be rewritten into more fluent prose, still on-device and still strictly grounded to the facts already in the caption, never inventing a person, place, or count that is not there.
AI photo descriptions are a Pro feature.
Smart Keyword Suggestions
Analyzed photos now offer curated, human-readable keyword suggestions, clearly badged so you know they came from image recognition, right in keyword autocomplete and the Batch Keyword Editor. MetaScope recognizes well over a thousand specific subjects out of the box, from dog and cat breeds to dishes, plants, instruments, sports, and landmarks, plus pets and people. Everything stays suggest-only, so nothing is written until you accept.
A new Auto-Keyword Folder… action lets you review an entire folder’s suggestions in a fast per photo accept or reject grid. Each suggestion shows a small source glyph (Vision or Enhanced) and a 1 to 3 dot match-strength indicator, so you can see at a glance how strong each match is (a relative strength, not a probability or a precision score).
Recognition You Can Tune and Trust
- Enhanced Recognition (Pro, optional). Turn on a second, broader on-device model that catches subjects Apple’s built-in recognizer misses (specific breeds, vehicles, scene objects), each shown as an “Enhanced” chip and boosted when both models agree. It is bundled with the app, so it is fully offline with no download.
- Calibrated accuracy. A simple More results / Balanced / Higher accuracy control now gates each kind of subject by how reliable it actually is, and changing it applies instantly to photos you have already analyzed.
- On your terms. Analyze or re-analyze a single photo right from the Info Panel, pause a long library scan and resume it later (a pause even survives quitting MetaScope), and clear all analysis data anytime.
Every part of Image Analysis runs entirely on your Mac. There is no upload, no network dependency, and no identities are recognized or stored.
Metadata Search That Keeps Itself Fresh
Auto-indexed Libraries now refresh for Metadata Search while MetaScope is open, so search stays current as files change in Finder, with next-refresh, indexed-count, and external-drive status visible in Settings. Each Library shows how many items it has indexed and can be cleared on its own, and a new Remove Entries Outside Libraries… tidies up anything left behind by folders you no longer track.
One-Click Metadata Scenarios
Copy Metadata and Date Operations each gain a row of plain-language scenarios (Restore after an AI edit, Make all dates match, Fix a wrong camera clock, Read dates from filenames) that set up a real task in a single click, with the full manual controls still right below.
More in This Release
- The Intelligence menu is now consistent everywhere. Right-click a file or a folder, in the browser or the sidebar, for the same Intelligence submenu.
- You can now write a description entirely by hand, alongside the AI Draft button.
- Favorites open faster and rapid clicks land where you expect.
- A photo you edit in Photos.app refreshes in the MetaScope grid without scrolling.
- Background re-indexing of auto-indexed Libraries is now incremental. It reprocesses only the files that actually changed instead of your whole library every cycle, keeping idle CPU low.
- A large reliability pass across iCloud folders, TIFF thumbnails, RAW metadata writing, and search-index cleanup.
Requirements
- macOS 15.4 Sequoia or later
- Apple Silicon or Intel Mac
- Enhanced Recognition and AI descriptions are Pro features
- The optional prose rewrite for AI descriptions requires macOS 26 with Apple Intelligence
Get MetaScope
MetaScope is available on the Mac App Store. Free tier includes 5 edits per day. MetaScope Pro unlocks unlimited edits and all professional features.