It’s a big deal that Apple added a new physical button to the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro. Camera Control opens the Camera app, takes photos like a traditional shutter button, and provides quick access to settings like zoom and exposure compensation.

But it’s not All this hard to miss check can do. In fact, Apple is counting on it to be a main component of Apple Intelligence — a way to get information about anything you point the camera at using the visual intelligence feature.

It can also perform two other tasks that would normally be triggered by the Action buttoneffectively making it a second action button.

Watch this: See the new visual intelligence of iPhone 16 in action

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Almost there: the Visual Intelligence button

Besides photography, the most important use of the camera control button will be visual intelligence, a feature that will use Apple Intelligence to identify information that is in front of the camera – in Apple’s demos, this includes getting details about a restaurant, name of a restaurant. a dog breed and get study aids via ChatGPT. Visual intelligence is currently available in the iOS 18.2 public beta And developer betaand the full version could arrive from December.

You’ll click and hold the camera control button to activate visual intelligence, then press the button again to display information about everything in the frame. Apple says Visual Intelligence will arrive later this year.

OK, visual intelligence seems to be cool when it arrives, but what can you do NOW? Two features that use the camera, but are not photo apps, are available for quick access using the Camera Control button. You can assign them to the Action button, but if it is occupied by something else, like the flashlight or a number of uses — you can actually turn the camera control into a second action button.

For now you can get an enlarged view

There are times when I admired Sherlock Holmes for always having a magnifying glass on him – at least, that’s the popular image of the detective. When I need to read a serial number or even small print on a menu in a dimly lit restaurant, I pull out my iPhone, open Control Center, and turn on Magnifier. Not only does this allow you to digitally zoom in on something, but you can also turn on the flashlight to see even better.

But currently, it’s a multi-step process of unlocking the phone, swiping down to open Control Center, and tapping the Magnifier button – which may not even be there, which requires more steps to add it.

Instead, go straight to magnifying glass using the camera control: Go to Settings > Camera > Camera Control and choose Magnifying glass.

Pressing the button now launches the magnifying glass. But it’s not just a shortcut: give it a firm touch to bring up the Camera Control’s pop-up overlay and zoom in by sliding your finger along its surface. Double-tap it to switch between zoom, contrast, brightness, and filters to change these settings without using the screen. (However, flashlight control isn’t included in the overlay, so you’ll need to enable it via on-screen controls: swipe up twice to show all magnification controls and press the flashlight button.)

In addition to quickly scanning QR codes

Do some people find themselves scanning QR codes so frequently that they need to access the Code Reader feature with just one button? Maybe. Then again, I went to the trouble of adding the Scan Code button to the Control Center a while ago, as it was more convenient than using the Camera app.

Go to Settings > Camera > Camera Control and choose Code scanner to assign the scanner to the camera control button. On launch, the pop-up control when you firmly press the button allows you to zoom in, something you can’t do otherwise.

It’s worth noting that Code Scanner has a few advantages over the Camera app. You can turn on the flashlight if you need more lighting, for example. It also loads the QR code destination in its own app space, instead of opening it in the Safari app where it could add to the clutter of open browser windows.

Apple’s developer guidelines state that camera control can only be used by apps that use the camera. So we won’t see any non-camera implementations for this button. But I can imagine other potential uses.

Perhaps it could serve as a quick document scanner to reduce the number of steps needed to insert a document into the Notes app. Or it could trigger Live Recognition accessibility mode for people who can access the camera control button more easily than the action button.