To remove spots in Lightroom, open the photo in the Develop module, press Q to pick the spot removal tool, size the brush just larger than the spot, and click on it. Lightroom picks a nearby patch to copy from and blends it in. The same tool removes sensor dust, skin blemishes, small distractions and specks on a scan, and the Visualize Spots view shows you every dust spot you would otherwise miss.
The tool’s name and panel have changed between versions. Older versions call it Spot Removal, with Heal and Clone modes. Newer versions group it with the other healing tools under a name such as Healing or Remove, and add a content-aware remove mode. In Lightroom Classic the shortcut is Q in every version, and the way the tool works is the same. The steps below follow Lightroom Classic.
How to use the spot removal tool, step by step
- Open the photo in Develop and zoom to 100 percent (press Z, or click in the image) so you see spots at their real size.
- Press Q or click the healing icon under the histogram. The tool’s options open below.
- Choose a mode. Heal is the right choice for most spots (the modes are explained below).
- Set the brush size a little larger than the spot. Use the bracket keys, [ to shrink and ] to enlarge, or the Size slider.
- Click the spot. Lightroom draws two circles: the spot you clicked and the source area it is copying from, joined by an arrow.
- Check the source. If the patch looks wrong, drag the source circle to a cleaner area with the same texture and brightness, or press / (forward slash) to let Lightroom pick another one.
- Fine tune with Feather (how soft the edge is) and Opacity (how strongly the fix covers the spot).
To fix something long and thin, such as a hair, a power line or a scratch, drag with the brush to paint over it instead of clicking. Hold Shift and click two points to paint a straight line between them. To choose the source yourself instead of letting Lightroom guess, hold Ctrl (Windows) or Cmd (Mac) and drag from the spot to the area you want to copy.
To change a fix later, click its pin to select it and adjust it, or press Delete to remove it. Every fix is stored as an instruction, so the original file is never changed and you can undo any of it.
Heal, clone and content-aware remove
- Heal copies the texture from the source area and blends its color and brightness into the surroundings of the spot. Use it for dust on skies, skin blemishes and most small spots. It is the default for good reason.
- Clone copies the source area exactly, color and brightness included, with no blending. Use it near hard edges and lines, where Heal can smear color across the edge, or when you want an exact copy of a pattern.
- Content-aware remove (in newer versions) fills the area by analyzing everything around it instead of copying one patch. It handles larger, irregular objects better than Heal, such as a sign, a branch or a person in the background.
If one mode leaves a smudge or a repeated texture, select the pin and switch modes; the fix updates in place.
How to find and remove all the dust spots in a photo
Dust on the camera’s sensor casts small, soft, dark spots onto every picture, always in the same place. They are easy to miss on a busy subject and obvious on plain areas such as sky, snow, water and studio backdrops. The two habits that catch them all:
Turn on Visualize Spots
With the tool active, tick Visualize Spots in the toolbar below the image, or press A (press T if the toolbar is hidden). The photo turns into a black and white outline view where dust appears as small white circles. Drag the slider next to the checkbox to make the view more or less sensitive, then click each spot directly in this view. Turn it off to check that the fixes look clean in the real image.
Scan the image in sections at 100 percent
Zoom to 100 percent, press Home to go to the top left corner, then press Page Down repeatedly. Lightroom moves through the photo one screen at a time, column by column, so you look at every part of the frame exactly once. Fix spots as you go.
Seeing the same spots on every photo? How to clean your camera’s sensor covers the in-camera cleaning, a blower, brushes, and when a wet clean is worth it.
Remove sensor dust from a whole shoot at once
Because sensor dust sits in the same spot on every frame taken with the same dirty sensor, you only need to fix one photo carefully and copy the fixes to the rest.
- Remove every dust spot from one photo, ideally one with a lot of plain sky.
- Select that photo first, then add the other photos from the same session in the filmstrip.
- Click Sync (Ctrl+Shift+S on Windows, Cmd+Shift+S on Mac).
- In the dialog, click Check None, then tick only the spot removal (or healing) option.
- Click Synchronize.
Then look through the synced photos. When the composition changes, a source circle can land on something different, such as a tree instead of sky, and leave a visible patch. Fix those few by dragging the source. Synced fixes only match while the dust stayed in the same place. A lens change or the camera’s sensor cleaning can move it, so check the frames before and after any such break separately.
Want to apply other edits to a set of photos too? Batch editing in Lightroom covers syncing, copying and pasting settings, and presets.
Why dust shows up more at small apertures
Dust sits on the glass in front of the sensor, not on the sensor itself. At a wide aperture such as f/2.8, light reaches the sensor from a wide cone of angles, so a dust particle casts a large, faint, blurred shadow that is often invisible. At a small aperture such as f/16 or f/22, the light comes from a narrow cone and the same particle casts a small, dark, sharp spot. That is why landscape photos shot at small apertures against a bright sky show dust that the same camera seemed free of at f/4. If you are checking for dust, photograph a plain sky or white wall at f/16 or smaller, slightly out of focus, and look at it with Visualize Spots on.
Wondering why f/22 looks softer as well as dustier? Lens diffraction explains why very small apertures reduce sharpness.
Removing blemishes from skin
Spot removal is also the quickest way to clean up skin in a portrait. Use Heal, a brush just larger than the blemish, and a moderate feather. Choose a source area from the same part of the face, with the same skin texture and light, so pores and shading match. For things that are part of the person, such as freckles, moles and scars, think twice before removing them; lowering the opacity of the fix to around half softens a mark without erasing it. For anything more than spots, such as smoothing skin or reshaping light, see photo retouching.
When to use Photoshop instead
Lightroom’s tool works on small and medium spots. Large objects, spots that cross complex patterns, and anything that needs the scene rebuilt behind it are easier in Photoshop, which has more precise healing, cloning and content-aware tools on separate layers. Many photographers do the general cleanup in Lightroom and send only the difficult photos to Photoshop.
Need to remove something bigger than a spot? Removing objects in Photoshop covers content-aware fill, the clone stamp, the healing brushes and the patch tool.
Common mistakes
- Brush much larger than the spot. A big brush replaces surrounding texture too and makes an obvious patch.
- Accepting the automatic source. Lightroom sometimes picks a patch with a different texture or an edge in it. Always look at where the source circle landed.
- Healing next to a hard edge. Heal can pull color across the edge. Use Clone there, or move the source along the edge.
- Checking at screen size only. Small spots disappear when the photo is zoomed out and reappear in a large print. Check at 100 percent.
- Syncing without checking. Synced fixes can land in the wrong place on a different composition. Review every synced photo.
Try this
Take a photo of a plain bright sky at f/16 with your camera, then open it in Lightroom and turn on Visualize Spots. Count the spots and remove each one with Heal. Then sync the fixes to two or three other photos taken the same day and check where each source circle landed. In ten minutes you will know how dirty your sensor is and how to clean up a whole shoot.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the spot removal tool in Lightroom?
In the Develop module, in the row of tool icons just under the histogram. In Lightroom Classic the shortcut Q opens it.
Why can I not see Visualize Spots?
It only appears while the spot removal tool is active, in the toolbar below the image. If the toolbar is hidden, press T to show it.
How do I remove the same dust spots from many photos?
Clean one photo, select it first and then the others, click Sync and tick only spot removal. Check each photo afterward, because the source areas may need moving on different compositions.
Does spot removal change my original file?
No. Lightroom saves each fix as an instruction in its catalog or a sidecar file, and the original stays untouched. You can edit or delete any fix at any time.
Can Lightroom remove sensor dust automatically?
It finds a source for each spot automatically, but you still click the spots. Visualize Spots and syncing make it fast: fix one photo by hand and apply the same fixes to the rest of the shoot.
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