The Pixel 6 lost Magic Eraser in its latest Photos update, but Google is working on a fix

Google Photos version 5.67 is bewitching some Pixel 6 units

The Pixel 6 and 6 Pro have been plagued by an avalanche of issues following their launch, and now, another (admittedly smaller) problem is piling on: Magic Eraser has disappeared for many people who have updated to the latest version of Google Photos. Luckily, a fix is already on the way.

According to a thread on Reddit, the Magic Eraser option in the Tools section under Google Photos’ editor is straight up missing in the latest app update, version 5.67. We’ve been able to corroborate as much reliably on a number of Pixel 6 units ourselves, and Mishaal Rahman shared as much on Twitter, as he ran into the same issue.

Left: How it should look like. Right: How it looks like.

While we initially suspected the problem to arise because of sideloading the wrong version of Google Photos on the Pixel 6 via APK Mirror or similar platforms, it looks like Magic Eraser is also disappearing for those using exclusively the Play Store for updates.

If you still have access to Magic Eraser, make sure you turn off automatic updates for Google Photos for the time being. You can do that by visiting the Google Photos Play Store listing on your phone and then hitting the three-dot menu in the top right corner, where you need to untick the Enable auto update checkmark.

It’s possible that Google has stopped the rollout of Google Photos version 5.67 already, as many people report not seeing the update anymore. However, given that Google likes to roll out new software in stages, the new release may simply not have reached everyone just yet, so better safe than sorry.

Once you’ve received Photos version 5.67 and Magic Eraser is gone, it seems like there’s nothing you can do to bring it back — for now. Even uninstalling all updates to the app doesn’t bring it back, which should usually fix issues like these. This might be because the Pixel 6 and 6 Pro initially shipped with a base version of Photos that doesn’t support Magic Eraser. New owners first had to update their Photos app to get access to Magic Eraser.

Google tells us it’s aware of the issue and is currently working on a fix. With any luck, it won’t be too long before every Pixel 6 owner has Magic Eraser back on their phone.

Thanks: Mishaal Rahman, Anthony Maki

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