After experimenting with all the photo filters on my iPhone, I’ve finally nailed down my favorites. Here’s why you should be using them for your pictures as well.

1Dramatic Warm - The Perfect Filter for Any Photo

The Dramatic Warm filter is exactly what it sounds like—it adds drama and warmth to your images (plus it lowers the saturation a bit). At first glance, it looks like this filter is ideal for achieving a vintage, academia, or retro aesthetic, which is true, but you can use it for anything depending on your subject or composition.

I prefer Dramatic Warm for cityscapes and landscapes, it’s reminiscent of those 80s travel magazines at grandma’s house. Turned all the way up, the filtercreates a moody, somewhat edgy look. But turning it down a bit brings out the softness of the warm sepia tones, which is what I’ve done here.

Dramatic Warm is the most versatile iPhone filter in my opinion, you can use it at different intensities for most of your pictures. And if you like darker and warmer aesthetics, it will probably also become your go-to.

2Vivid Cool - Best for Winter and Nightlife Photography

When I have an image that clashes with Dramatic Warm, chances are the Vivid Cool filter will be a good fit as it does the opposite in terms of light and color. It increases the brightness and boosts the blue hues in your picture.

Vivid Cool is a good fit for images that already feature blues and grays. It quite literally makes an image feel colder, making it ideal forenhancing your winter shots. Just keep in mind that it does turn up the brightness, so it works best on slightly underexposed shots, especially when there are a lot of whites in the image such as snow.

I applied the filter to a cityscape shot, but since it doesn’t snow in that area, you couldn’t tell that it was shot on a cold day. So the filter helps convey the feeling of being cold.

I also tried the filter on stock images of brutalist architecture and busy nightlife as I’ve never had the chance to photograph such scenery myself. And it’s a perfect fit in my opinion.

3Silvertone - A Unique Black-and-White Effect

Silvertone is one of the three black-and-white iPhone filters. What makes this one my favorite is that it’s basically the monochromatic version of Dramatic Warm. When you turn it all the way up, you’ll see it has the slightest golden undertones—a bit ironic given its name. This warm hue gives it more life compared to the other black-and-white filters.

The Silvertone filter also bumps up the contrast, so it’s ideal for images that fall flat. I applied the filter to some of my cloud photography, and it gave the clouds a pretty cool metallic glow and added an overall vintage feel to the shot. But I don’t like that the dark bits of the architecture in the foreground are too dark now, so be mindful of the contrast boost with this filter.

4Mono - Best for Simple Black-and-White Photos

As someone who’s not ablack-and-white photographyexpert, I tend to rely on filters to get the black-and-white look, and Mono is my go-to. It produces a completely different result from Silvertone—lower contrast and no warm tones, leaving you with a nice blank slate for performing further edits to enhance black-and-white photos. But the black-and-white effect is not what I like most about this filter…

Applying the Mono filter and dialing it down gives me the moody, less colorful look I usually aim for in my edits. I use it as a shortcut when I don’t want to do extensive editing, and then I apply one of the three abovementioned filters afterward.

5Dramatic - Best for Portraits

My last pick is the Dramatic filter. I love using this for selfies because it’s perfect forenhancing portraits. It turns down the saturation a bit and ups the contrast, which almost acts like color correction, leaving you with a cleaner look that’s ready for further edits. But you’re able to also leave it as is—the desaturated colors make for a softer look, while the enhanced contrast brings out the details in your image.

These iPhone camera filters have earned their spot as my favorites for their versatile yet unique effects. If you’re an everyday smartphone photographer like me, landscapes and portraits are probably also your main focus, so give these filters a try and see how they can enhance your shots.