How to Add a Watermark to Photos on Android & iPhone

A watermark keeps your name attached to a picture after it leaves your camera roll. This guide covers how to add a watermark to photos on Android and iPhone: the steps, the settings that decide whether the result looks considered or slapped on, and how to put the same mark on a whole set without rebuilding it every time.

Worth deciding before you start: not every photo needs a mark. A watermark costs you a little of the image and buys you credit, so which photos actually earn one is a question worth answering first.

How to Add a Watermark to Photos, Step by Step

The route below is the same on both platforms. The Watermark Maker app is free to install on Android and iOS, and every step here works on the free tier.

1. Open the app and tap the Image tile. The home screen has three layouts you can switch between, so go by the tile name rather than where it sits. You can also share a photo into the app from your gallery.
2. Pick your photo. The picker opens your gallery; nothing is captured inside the app itself.
3. Choose a watermark type. The editor has three tabs, Text, Image and QR, and one export carries one of them.
4. Write or import the mark. On Text, type up to 100 characters, then pick a typeface under TYPOGRAPHY and a colour from the six swatches under COLOR. On Image, tap Pick Logo and choose a file from your gallery.
5. Set SCALE and OPACITY. Both sliders sit on every tab. Opacity runs 0–100% and starts at 60%; scale runs 0.5× to 3.0× and starts at 1.0×.
6. Place it under LAYOUT & POSITION. Leave it on SINGLE and tap one of the nine anchors, or switch to TILED to repeat it across the picture.
7. Tap Export and choose Export Size. Keep Original Size, pick one of the eight SOCIAL MEDIA presets, or enter your own width and height under CUSTOM. The watermarked copy lands in your camera roll and your original file is untouched.

On an iPhone there is also a no-app route through the Photos app's Markup tools, along with the reasons people stop using it. That comparison is in the iPhone watermarking guide.

Text, Logo or QR: Choosing the Watermark for Your Image

Three types, and the choice matters more than the settings do.

• Text is the default answer for most people. Your name, your handle or your site, in one of 31 built-in typefaces — 10 of which are on the free tier, with the other 21 on Premium. It reads at any size and it never looks like a mistake.
• A logo turns every shared image into the same piece of branding. Tap Pick Logo and import a file from your gallery. A PNG with a transparent background is the right choice; a JPG imports fine, but it brings its opaque rectangle with it, which shows the moment you drop the opacity. There is more on preparing the file in the guide to adding a logo without desktop software.
• A QR code encodes a URL or any text and sits on the photo like any other mark. It is a Premium feature. One caution: the code is drawn in the text colour, which defaults to white, and it has no background plate behind it — over a busy photo at low opacity, a scanner may not read it.

One mark per export. The three tabs are a switcher, not layers, so you cannot put a logo and your name on the same image in one pass. If you genuinely need both, export once and re-import the result as the source for a second pass.

What Size and Opacity a Watermark Should Be

This is the part no tool page answers, and it is the difference between a watermark that reads as deliberate and one that reads as damage.

A logo carries slightly more opacity than text because a shape at 30% turns to mush, where letterforms survive it.

The reason those percentages hold at all is worth knowing. The app does not size marks in pixels; it measures them against the photo's shortest side and then multiplies by whatever SCALE you set. Text starts at 4% of the shortest side, so the 0.5×–3.0× range puts it between 2% and 12%. A logo's longest edge starts at 15%, giving a range of 7.5% to 45%. A QR code is a square at that same 15%. Edge positions inset by 5%.

The practical payoff: one design looks the same on a phone screenshot and on a full-resolution camera file, and you never have to re-tune it per image. That is also why a mark you set once can be reused across a whole shoot.

Per-platform numbers are a different question, because Instagram, TikTok and YouTube crop and compress differently. Those are in the social media watermark size guide.

Where the Watermark Goes, and the One Thing You Can't Do

Position is a three-by-three grid of anchors — nine positions, defaulting to bottom-right. Tap the corner, edge or centre you want.

There is no free dragging, and no rotation. The preview has no drag gesture and the app has no rotation control, so a mark angled diagonally across the frame is not something you can build here. If a guide tells you to drag your watermark into place or set it at 45°, it is describing different software.

That constraint matters less than it sounds, because the anchor grid is what makes a mark consistent across a set. Hand-placing is the reason a folder of watermarked photos ends up with forty slightly different results.

The real placement trade-off is corner versus tiled:

• A corner mark stays out of the picture and is easy to crop off. Fine for social posts where credit is the point.
• A tiled mark repeats across the whole image and cannot be cropped away. Switch SINGLE to TILED, choose GRID or DIAMOND under PATTERN, then set DENSITY to Low, Med or High. DIAMOND offsets alternate rows by half a step, like brickwork. Tiling is free and ungated, and it is the right choice for client proofs and preview images.

One thing the export presets do not do is crop. A photo sent to a preset size is scaled to fit and centred on a blurred, dimmed copy of itself, so your subject never gets cut off at the edges of an unfamiliar aspect ratio.

How to Add a Watermark to Pictures in Bulk, and Reuse the Design

Everything above applies to one photo. Two features handle the rest of the folder, and both have a free tier worth knowing before you start.

Batch applies one design to a whole selection in a single run. A few photos per batch are free; Premium removes the cap. Tap the Batch tile, select your images, and the Batch Editor opens with the same controls as the single-photo editor, plus an unlabelled + tile for adding more. Export All carries the count of what you selected.

Two honest limits: the batch preview shows only the first image, so you are judging the design on photo one, and a batch does not survive you switching apps mid-run. Set the design first, then start the export and leave it alone. The batch watermarking guide covers the workflow in more depth.

Templates solve the other half. Save Template stores the whole design under a name, including a copy of the logo file, and Load Template brings it back in the image, batch, video or PDF editor. The free tier saves a small number of templates and Premium removes that limit. This is what turns watermarking from a task into a habit: build the mark once, and every future photo is a couple of taps.

What a Copyright Watermark Actually Does

People search for "copyright watermark" expecting a legal instrument, and it is not one. Adding a copyright symbol and your name to an image is a statement of authorship that travels with the file. It makes casual reposting feel like taking something, and it makes the origin obvious when a picture surfaces somewhere you did not put it.

What it does not do is stop anyone who is determined, and it is not a substitute for the other things that actually help. The honest account of what watermarks protect against covers the rest.

Frequently asked questions

How do you put a watermark on a photo for free?

Text and logo watermarks are both on the free tier, along with tiling, the nine position anchors, the size and opacity sliders, the export presets and small batches. Ten of the 31 built-in typefaces are free. Nothing the app adds to a free export carries its own branding, which is the usual trade-off with free watermarking tools. Video, PDF, QR codes and unlimited batches are Premium.

Can you put more than one watermark on the same photo?

Not in a single pass. The Text, Image and QR tabs are a switcher rather than layers, so one export carries one mark. If you need both a logo and your name on the same image, export it once with the first mark, then re-import that exported file and run it through again with the second. It works, but it is two passes, not one.

How big should a watermark be on a photo?

About 10 to 15 percent of the image width is the range that reads clearly without competing with the picture. Pair it with 30 to 50 percent opacity for text, or 40 to 60 percent for a logo, since a shape loses its edges faster than letterforms do. If you are tiling the mark across the whole image, drop to 25 to 35 percent so the photo still shows through.

Can you watermark several pictures at once?

Yes. Batch mode applies one design to a whole selection at the same size and position, so the results are identical rather than forty near-misses. A few photos per batch are free, and Premium removes the cap. Save the design as a template first and you can reload it for the next set instead of rebuilding it each time.

Does adding a watermark reduce photo quality?

The export is a new file and your original photo is never modified, so nothing is lost from what you already have. What you choose at export is size, not quality: keep the original dimensions, pick one of the social media presets, or enter your own. The presets scale and centre the image rather than cropping it, so the framing survives.

Wrapping Up

Set the mark once at 10–15% of the image width and 30–50% opacity, anchor it where it will not be cropped away, and save it as a template. After that, watermarking a photo is a couple of taps, and watermarking the next set is one batch.