Where each feature lives

SnapFlow gives you the same account and the same albums on three different "surfaces" — three ways to get at your work. Think of them as three doors into one building. Pick the door that's closest to the job in front of you:

• Web app Web — the control centre. You reach it in any browser at snap-flow.org. It can do everything: albums, galleries, recognition fixes, proofing, socials, account and billing. When in doubt, the answer is "do it on the web."
• Desktop sync app Desktop app (macOS only) — your studio workstation. It works local-first: import straight off an SD card, cull a huge take fast, develop your RAWs, edit metadata, and sync your picks and edits two ways with the web. The free download is called SnapFlow Sync.
• iOS app iOS — the event-day companion in your pocket. Upload a handful of phone shots, run recognition, share a gallery QR, post to Instagram, and now do a quick on-device develop pass — all from the field. It has four tabs: Albums, Edit, Posts and Reels.

The account, the albums, your ratings, your metadata and your recognition results all sit in one place behind these three doors. Star a photo on iOS and it shows up starred on the web. Tag a face on the web and the desktop app sees the name. Nothing is "stuck" on one surface.

At a glance

This is the master cheat-sheet. Every row is one job; the columns tell you which surface does it, and how well. Read the legend right below before you scan the table.

Legend

• ✓ — fully supported here.
• — — not available on this surface (use one of the others).
• set up — you configure it here, but the action happens elsewhere (e.g. you switch on camera FTP on the web, but the camera does the uploading).
• partial — a lighter version: you can do some of it here, the full job lives on another surface.
• view — read-only: you can see it but not change it here.

Task	Web	Desktop	iOS
Create & edit albums and their settings	✓	✓	✓
Upload from a computer / phone	✓	✓	✓ (≤10 at a time)
Camera FTP (live during a shoot)	set up	—	active-album picker
SD-card import + filename templates + ingest profiles	—	✓	—
Pro culling — compare, 1:1 loupe, bulk rate	basic	✓	rate / reject
Edit / develop photos (RAW)	—	✓ (full develop + learned Album Styles)	✓ (on-device basic + Save to album)
Run recognition & name faces	✓	✓	✓
Fix numbers / teams / vehicles / helmets	✓ (deep fixes)	partial	name / share / ignore
Metadata / IPTC editing	✓	✓ (LR round-trip, presets, hierarchy, codes, Stationery ⌘⌥T, Studio AI toggle)	headline / caption / keywords
Gallery themes & access control	✓	—	edit toggles
Client proofing & finals delivery	✓	finals push	—
Instagram posts, Stories & reels	✓ (full)	—	✓ (Posts + Reels composers)
Search & smart collections	search	✓	—
Integrity verification & CLI	—	✓	—
Share QR / links / Apple Wallet	✓	—	✓
Account, storage & billing	✓	view	view

What each surface is best at

The web app — the complete control centre

Everything works on the web. It's the only surface that does galleries and themes, client proofing, the full Instagram suite, account and billing, and the deep recognition corrections. If a feature exists in SnapFlow at all, you can drive it from the web.

• Manage albums, galleries and access control end to end.
• Run client proofing and deliver finals.
• Post to Instagram (Stories, feed posts, carousels, reels) and cross-post to TikTok — see Socials.
• Make the deep recognition fixes: a number, a team, a vehicle, a helmet — see Recognition.
• Edit your account, storage and billing under the avatar → Settings — see Account & settings.

The desktop sync app — local-first studio work

Desktop app The desktop app (macOS) is where you do the heavy lifting on a real computer: import off a card, cull fast, develop RAWs and round-trip your metadata with Lightroom.

• SD-card import with filename templates and reusable ingest profiles — see Importing from a card.
• Fast culling — a 1:1 loupe (the big single-photo view), keyboard rating, Compare view and bulk rate. See Culling.
• Develop your RAWs locally — a full Lightroom-style develop editor (Exposure, WB, curves, Color Mixer, masks, crop). Every edit is written to an .xmp sidecar so your photo opens already-edited in Lightroom. You can also learn a look from your past edits and set it as the album's auto-edit Album Style. See Editing & styles.
• Metadata round-trip with Lightroom — read keywords (including slash-separated hierarchies), captions, ratings and colour labels out of LR's .xmp sidecars, and write SnapFlow's IPTC back out. Bulk-fill with the Stationery Pad (⌘⌥T), saved presets, a keyword tree and code replacements; toggle Studio AI metadata per album. See Metadata.
• Two-way sync with the web — your picks and edits ride up, and new uploads come down. See Sync.

The iOS app — the event-day companion

iOS The iOS app is the small, fast door you use at the event. It has four tabs along the bottom — Albums, Edit, Posts and Reels:

• Albums — upload a handful of phone shots (up to 10 at a time), rate or reject them, run recognition, and share a gallery QR or Apple Wallet pass on the spot. See Albums on iOS.
• Edit — a quick on-device develop pass. Import a photo (from your Photo Library, a SnapFlow album, or Files), nudge the basic sliders with a live preview, then Save to album to upload a finished JPEG as a new photo. The original is never touched. See Editing on iPhone.
• Posts — a full Instagram post composer (single posts, carousels, AI auto, AI tips, Stories). See Socials on iOS.
• Reels — a full reel composer (build a reel from photos, upload a finished clip, add AI text overlays). See Socials on iOS.
• Recognition — name a face cluster, share its QR, or ignore a bystander. The deep number/team fixes still happen on the web. See Recognition on iOS.

Rules of thumb

When you're not sure which door to use, lean on these:

• Heavy editing and corrections → the web. The deep recognition fixes (fix a number, set a team, merge clusters, manage a car's drivers) live on the web. The desktop app and iOS hand you to the web for those.
• Developing your RAWs → the desktop app. It has the full develop editor (and can learn a look as your Album Style). iOS does a quick basic pass; the web doesn't develop at all.
• Culling a big take → the desktop app is fastest: Compare view, 1:1 loupe, keyboard-driven rating, and "push only the keepers."
• At the event → the iOS app. Upload a few phone shots, kick off recognition, and share a gallery QR on the spot.
• Everything else → the web app can do it all; the other two are accelerators for specific moments.

How to get each surface

Two of the three surfaces are separate downloads. Here's where to grab them.

1. Web app — nothing to install. Open snap-flow.org in any browser and click Sign in. — your dashboard (My Albums) opens. See Getting started.
2. Desktop sync app — on the web, click your avatar (top-right) → Settings → the Integrations tab. Under SnapFlow Sync, click Download for Mac. — a .dmg file downloads; open it and drag SnapFlow Sync into your Applications folder. See Install the desktop app.
3. iOS app — install SnapFlow from the App Store on your iPhone, open it, and sign in with the same email and password. — the four-tab app appears. See Getting started on iOS.