Google introduced its Magic Eraser feature with the Pixel 6 and 6 Pro, and it made a huge splash because it made it easier to remove uninvited guests and objects from images. Google wasn't the first or only one to bring an object-erasing functionality at that time, though. Samsung launched a similar feature called Object Eraser with the Galaxy S21 the same year, and Adobe Photoshop has been able to do it for many years. Google's clever implementation on the software front made it look almost like magic, but is Google's tool to remove photo bombers actually the best one out there?

I wanted to see how Google's Magic Eraser stacked up against Samsung's Object Eraser, so I grabbed a Google Pixel 7 and a Samsung Galaxy S23 to start editing. I captured new images with the phones and used some older ones to see how they both handle the samples. I also ran a few of those samples through other apps to see how the results compared with these one-click implementations.

Availability and ease of use

Both of these tools come pre-installed on your phone. Google's Magic Eraser tool can be accessed via the Google Photos app, whereas Samsung's Object Eraser tool can be found within Samsung's Gallery app. However, it's worth mentioning that Google's Magic Eraser is no longer exclusive to Pixel phones, meaning you can use it on other devices, provided you have a Google One subscription. Samsung's Object Eraser, on the other hand, is exclusive to Samsung's Gallery app that comes pre-installed on Samsung phones.

Before I start discussing my experience with them, I'd like to point out that both Magic Eraser and Object Eraser work on existing images in your library. I am happy to report that there's no weird gatekeeping when it comes to the images you can use these tools on. You should be able to tweak any image as long as you can import them to your phone or a supported device (so not your computer). Both of these apps are easy to use, too.

How to use Magic Eraser in Google Photos

  1. Open the Google Photos app and select the image you want to edit.
  2. Once you've opened the image, select the edit button from the bottom menu.
  3. Now, navigate to the Tools option to find the Magic Eraser option.
  4. Using your finger, circle people or objects you'd like removed from your photo.

Google Photos is fairly smart, so it may automatically present you the option to remove people or objects from your image if/when it detects them. If it does, you'll see a pop-up under your image that says Remove people in background.

A screenshot the Magic Eraser suggestion in Google Photos.
  1. Open the Gallery app on your Samsung phone and select an image to edit.
  2. Once you've opened the image, select the edit icon from the bottom menu to expand the editing tools.
  3. Select the three-dot icon in the bottom right corner of the screen to open a pop-up window with more options.
  4. From here, select Object eraser to start removing unwanted objects, shadows, reflections, and more from your images.
  5. You can tap on people or objects you'd like removed or circle them with your finger.
  6. To erase your selections, tap on Erase.

Both tools are fairly simple to use. It only took me a few seconds to figure out how each of them worked, and I was removing and masking distracting elements from images in no time. They both have slightly different approaches to the removal process. So as much as I would like to pick a side and tell you which one's better, I liked using them both depending on the image I was editing.

Google Photos can be smarter at times, and it automatically gives suggestions to remove people or objects from an image even before I jump into the Magic Eraser tool. You won't see this option all the time, but it makes it a breeze to remove distracting elements when it does. I've never seen these suggestions on Samsung's Gallery app, so it's likely not actively scanning your images for unwanted objects or people. However, Samsung's Object Eraser is good at identifying the object you're trying to remove, and it selects it for you. Of course, it doesn't work on all images, so you'll also have to manually select the objects in some cases.

A screenshot showing Magic Eraser automatically highlighting people to remove.

As far as the manual process is concerned, you have to open the tool and draw an outline or fill in the element you're trying to remove in Magic Eraser. In Samsung's case, you can either draw an outline or simply tap the distracting elements you want to remove.

Both tools are fairly accurate in identifying which elements of the images you're trying to select. I tried this will a bunch of samples and I can't think of a particular case in which one was better than the other at marking the element I was trying to remove. You can always go back to an image and reselect and remove the leftover part.

Google Magic Eraser vs Samsung Object Eraser: Which one is better?

To present my observations from my tests, you can view the examples below.

Unless otherwise mentioned, the images below are ordered from left: original photo, Samsung Object Eraser result, Google Magic Eraser result.

Let's start off with a fairly simple image with good lighting and only a couple of distractions to remove. Here's a pretty good shot of my friend, which I think could've been better if I framed it to avoid capturing other people in the background. Let's try to remove them using our tools to see what we get.

Both tools did a good job of removing people in the background. I like the results produced by Samsung's Object Eraser better here because it managed to add a natural blur to mask the edges, whereas Google Photos seem to have left a visual clutter.

Now, let's challenge the tool with a fairly complex edit.

Both tools did an excellent job of removing the people from the original sample, but I once again like that Samsung's Object Eraser tool managed to mask the table toward the right after removing the person standing next to it. It's not something you immediately notice on Google's photo, but you can't unsee it once you spot the issue. That being said, Google Photos automatically highlighted the people to remove from this image, whereas I had to manually draw the outline for them in Samsung's case.

Let's check out another example before moving to an example with objects.

Samsung's Object Eraser once again did a better job of removing people and filling those spots properly for a better result. Notice how Google's Magic Eraser simply fills the spot with solid colors as opposed to matching the pattern around the original subject? Here's a side-by-side comparison of a spot from the previous example to give you a better idea.

It's time to check out an example in which Google's Magic Eraser did a better job of removing distractions from an image.

This is a classic example of how smart Google's Magic Eraser is, and how effortlessly it selected the wires running between the buildings in the frame to remove them. It also managed to remove the parked car towards the bottom of the image. I had to manually select all the wires in the case of Samsung's object eraser tool, and the result is, well, not perfect. In fact, I had to select the wires a few times over to properly highlight them.

Lastly, we have a set of images where both tools delivered a solid result. Google's Magic Eraser was once again quick to highlight the stem that I wanted to remove, whereas Samsung's tool made me highlight it manually. The results, however, are almost identical.

Additional features

But the apps aren't just about clicking on elements in an image to remove them. Samsung's Object Eraser also comes with buttons to let you remove shadows and reflections from an image with just a single tap. There's nothing to write home about these features, unfortunately, because I couldn't get them to work properly across images, but here are some samples if you want to look.

The first image is what I managed to capture with my Galaxy S23. You can see a lot of reflection on the packet since I wasn't trying to compose it properly. The second image is what came out after I processed it using Samsung's Object Eraser tool. The Erase reflections button didn't exactly remove all the reflections, but the result is much better than the original image.

Now let's take a look at what the "Erase shadows" option did.

Samsung's tool did manage to tone down the aggressive shadows seen in the first image. It's not perfect — I would've liked to see the shadows within the case treated as well — but it's not too bad overall. I like what Samsung is doing here, but it definitely needs more time in the oven before I can rely on it to work on the details.

Are there photo editing alternatives?

Google's Magic Eraser and Samsung's Object Eraser aren't the only tools out there that can remove these distracting objects from your photos. There are plenty of photo editing apps out there that can help with removing objects, provided you spend some time tweaking them. Apps like Adobe Photoshop and Snapseed come with a healing tool to let you remove many of these distractions. I wouldn't count on apps like Snapseed to get perfect results, but you'll likely do better with a little bit of manual editing using Photoshop. Adobe even introduced "content-aware fill" with Photoshop 2022 to make such edits better.

An image showing the galaxy s23 and Google Pixel 7 with their gallery apps on screen.

Photoshop, however, is paid software that's rather expensive and out of reach for most users. It's also not as easy or seamless as opening the image in your phone's gallery and tapping a few buttons to get the desired results. The Photoshop app on smartphones is not as advanced as the PC version, and my results were just as underwhelming as the ones I managed to get from Snapseed.

Google Magic Eraser vs Samsung Object Eraser: Which app is best?

Both of these apps are impressive. I wasn't expecting to see the kind of results these tools managed to produce. That being said, I prefer the final images that were processed using Samsung's Object Eraser. This particular tool was able to consistently produce good results, even with the dozen other samples that I processed outside the scope of this post, and could present proper replacements for the objects I removed by matching the types of patterns and colors.

Google's Magic Eraser isn't bad by any means; it just fell short, especially when it came to replacing the backgrounds. Magic Eraser was mostly filling those spots with solid colors or pop-ins that looked weird across multiple samples. I do like how smart Google Photos is, though, because it makes the process easier by suggesting elements to remove. It's only a matter of time before Google updates this tool with better content-aware fill to make it better than other options. But until then, I'll stick to Samsung's Object Eraser even though I have to manually tap or highlight the object or people to remove it.