Photo automation with the Camera widget

By The IFTTT Team

Published May 21, 2025

Updated September 17, 2026

Your phone camera is the easiest tool to capture and share the world around you. IFTTT's popular Camera widget service makes it possible to trigger automations with a quick snap. Camera Applets are perfect whether you want to save, send, or share the photos you take.

To get started, simply download the powerful (and free) IFTTT app on iOS or Android.

Then, simply choose the Applet of your choice and add this handy widget to your home screen. You can use any of the 7 Camera widget triggers to create your own Applet or choose from the most-loved Applets below.

Save a photo for later

Snap a picture and send it to the cloud storage service of your choice. This is a great way to keep track of receipts, expenses, or handwritten notes. For students, this can be an easy tool to maintain copies of what the teacher wrote on a board or take a picture of a sketch you worked on with a group.

Quickly create notes for later with integrations between the Camera widget and Pocket or Evernote.

Quickly send a photo

Use the Camera widget to automatically forward the image you take to yourself, friends, family, or colleagues. Send the photo to any of the hundreds of apps on IFTTT.

These automations make it simple to send pictures to any number of people with a quick snap. This can be a great way to keep people in your life updated on what you are doing or to share relevant information with your team in a quick way. This is also a simple way to send yourself a copy of a photo for a future time via email.

Seamlessly share a photo

The Camera widget is also perfect for those who want to immediately share their surroundings with the world. With two quick clicks you can add a photo to an album on Facebook, post it to Twitter, or add it to your blog.

Scan a QR code

QR code triggers are our latest addition to the family of widget automations. Use any of the six QR code triggers to customize Applets that suit your needs. You can maintain a history of your scanned QR codes, send yourself information for later, quick-add events to your calendar, track time, or save a contact - all from a simple scan! Our Regex and wildcard triggers also allow for deep customization around your code preferences. See our full breakdown of QR code triggers here.