Lightroom Hidden Features | Speed up your Editing Workflow [2025]
Many people feel stuck in the photo editing rut and spend their hours tweaking sliders.
You see other Lightroom users meeting their full potential while editing, but you still need that one. The basic adjustments may not perform in the way you want to, letting you feel down and sad about your edits.
No worries at all because every problem has a certain solution that you have to find around yourself. Lightroom has a treasure trove of hidden features that many people don’t know.
If you are among the 58% of people who use Lightroom, these features will help you a lot to make your editing smooth and perfect.
What are the Hidden Lightroom Features?
The hidden Lightroom features are tricks that can help you maintain the workflow and convert it to high quality. By exploring these features, it becomes easy to understand powerful tools and make quick edits.
For instance, you can reject and delete multiple images to keep your folders organized and save space on the desk. Besides, you can use Caps Lock to manage things more quickly and move Lightroom automatically to the next Image.
Some other hidden Lightroom features are given below that you can use to make your edits more professional.
- Applying keywords to bulk images helps organize photos in libraries and saves time when finding them.
- ALT/option is a hidden trick to speed up your Keyword flow.
- Activate the Solo mode to avoid scrolling. For instance, while working with the Basics tab to make certain corrections in the images, other tabs will be closed.
- Utilize the Lightroom/s Spot Removal Tool to visualize spots while post-processing.
- You can make sync adjustments with multiple images when processing images in bulk.
To overcome this common myth that processing in Lightroom is a time-consuming task. Lightroom users need to uncover the potential of hidden features and use them to make quick edits.
Another feature that helps to save your time while editing tons of images in Lightroom is to import Lightroom presets.
Use Targeted Adjustment Tools to adjust Specific Parts
The Targeted adjustment tools help to adjust any particular area of the image while editing. It is known as TAT and is a hidden gem that automatically targets the adjustments and saves your time.
For instance, you can brighten the sky images by clicking on the “Adjust saturation by dragging in the Photo.”
By using this tool, you will have the following benefits;
- Precise Control to target specific areas.
- Quick adjustments, making the workflow faster than before.
- Intuitive Editing for visual workflow.
- Refine and make smaller adjustments by dragging left/right.
- Using the HSL Panel to make specific color adjustments.
Important: Learn out the best ways to blur background in Lightroom using the extensive features.
Sharpening Mask to gain temporary white & black Outline
The sharpening mask helps sharpen the objects in your images without damaging the smooth areas. By applying this Mask, you can easily protect the regions where sharpening is not needed.
While using this, you have to hold the ALT/Option key and adjust the Masking slider. You will see where the sharpening mask is applied, which will turn white, and the black areas will remain the same.
Here are some more tips for using the sharpening mask;
- Use the Zoom Tool to see the mask visualization and brush strokes clearly.
- Begin with a light touch on the brush and gradually build the Mask.
- Check the impact of sharpening by the Y key shortcut option and see the edited and unedited versions.
Read Also: How to Soften images in Adobe Lightroom?
Remove the Dust Spots by using the Dust Spot Removal Too
By using the Dust Spot Removal tool, you can remove all the unwanted objects and dust spots from the images. To utilize the tool, you have to visualize the spots in the Image clearly.
Tap on the Healing Tool in the side panel and then click on the visualize spots. Now zoom in on the spots and remove them using the tool. You may use the Clone tool, which copies the texture and details from the chosen area to cover the dust spot.
Trying both brushes will let you reveal which one works best for you to remove the dust spots and image textures.
Use the Horizon Straightening Tool to Fix your Images
To make your landscapes professional, use the Horizon Straightening Tool to fix your images. For instance, many of the photos don’t have their horizon fixed; using this tool fixes and balances them in a few clicks.
Tap on Crop Overlay Tool > Angle Tool > Drag the Horizon Line. You’ll notice that the image appears to be straight. A manual rotation tool may help you to take precise control. Explore different grid options and choose the options that suit you.
Mask your Image temporarily (Before/After Reveal)
Masking tools help you to see the adjustments in your images before and after edits. You can check the fine-tuned adjustments by using the tool in unedited and edited versions.
The backlash () key will toggle to visualize the before and after effects. Use the Y key and split the screen to check clearly.
Create Panoramas to align and blend Images
It is a common myth that Lightroom cannot create panoramas, and you have to use Adobe Photoshop for this purpose. However, now you can use Lightroom to create panoramas for alignment and blending images.
Select the photos that you want to stitch together by following the steps: Right-click on the Image > Tap on “Photo Merge” > Panorama. You will see a seamless panorama that creates increased image resolution with a simplified workflow.
Though, Lightroom is famous for its amazing features, these features help to smooth skin, do batch editing, and make your images more professional.
Histogram as a Control Interface
One of the most powerful, robust, and underused features of Lightroom is its interactive Histogram. Using this histogram, you can click and drag on the corresponding sections of histogram to adjust exposure, shadows, highlights, whites, and blacks directly.
There is no need of dragging sliders in the Basic Panel, simply hover over a tonal area including blacks, shadows, exposures, whites, until highlights to adjust the tone.
Using this approach will provide you a real-time visual feedback to understand and maintain how much tone you are applying. You can maintain the tonal integrity by using this approach. Besides, it really helps to make an intuitive balance of light and dark in your images.
Histogram is the best option acting as a control over to adjust tones directly while editing in Lightroom. You can also monitor the color channels using Histogram as it reflects the lightest value of each color.
Final Words
Only some people who use Lightroom know its hidden features; however, they make a great impact on editing. Using different tools together helps you take advantage of Lightroom’s editing tools. Start using the editing tools now and ensure your editing is more professional than before.
