Raw SmithBlog
A RAW photo editor with no account and no cloud upload
Raw Smith is a RAW editor for iPhone, iPad and Mac with no account and no server of its own. You download it, import your RAWs and edit; nothing is uploaded unless you turn on iCloud sync, and then it goes only to your own private iCloud. It has no analytics, no ads and no third-party SDKs, and its AI features run on your device.
People look for this for different reasons. Some don't want another login. Some travel where uploads are slow or expensive. Some photograph people or places that shouldn't sit on a third party's server, or simply don't want their work used for anything they didn't agree to. A long-running thread on Adobe's forum, Is it possible to completely disable cloud sync of Lightroom mobile?, shows how common the wish is.
Can you use Lightroom without cloud sync?
It depends which Lightroom.
- Lightroom mobile (iPhone, iPad, Android). In that thread, Adobe Community Expert John Beardsworth sums it up: you can pause sync, "but disable no." Syncing to Adobe's cloud is what the app is built around. You can store albums locally for offline editing, but you can't switch the cloud off.
- Lightroom (desktop). It can also work with local files outside the cloud, and users on Adobe's forum are asking for the same on mobile.
- Lightroom Classic. Its catalog lives on your computer and only syncs if you turn sync on. It's still a subscription app, so you sign in to Adobe to licence it.
Lightroom is a capable editor and its cloud is the point for many people. If you want the opposite, here is what that looks like in Raw Smith.
What "no account" means in Raw Smith
The privacy policy starts with one sentence: Raw Smith is built so that we never see your photos or anything about them. In practice:
| In Raw Smith | |
|---|---|
| Account | None. No sign-up, no login, no Raw Smith server that stores your information. |
| Analytics and ads | None. No analytics, no crash reporting of its own, no advertising identifiers, no third-party SDKs. The app makes no network requests to us. |
| Photos and edits | On your device. On the Mac, Raw Smith refers to each original where you imported it from. On iPhone and iPad it keeps a copy in the app, visible in the Files app. |
| AI features | On your device. Subject, sky, people, face and object masks, and the culling hints (focus, closed eyes, similar photos), use Apple's Vision framework locally. Nothing is uploaded to make them. |
| Sync | Optional, through your own private iCloud database. Off until you turn it on. |
| Purchases | Handled entirely by the App Store. We receive no payment details. |
You do need an Apple Account to download anything from the App Store, and to use iCloud sync. That's Apple's account, which you already have; Raw Smith doesn't add one of its own.
Sync is optional, and it's your iCloud
Raw Smith works fully on one device with sync off, which is how it starts. If you want the same library on your iPhone, iPad and Mac, turn on Sync photos with iCloud in Settings › iCloud on each device.
When it's on, your library is stored in your own private iCloud database through Apple's CloudKit, under your Apple Account and in your iCloud storage, and downloaded by your other devices signed in to the same account. We have no access to it. Names, captions, keywords and edits are stored as encrypted fields, so with Advanced Data Protection turned on for your Apple Account they're end-to-end encrypted. Apple's handling of iCloud data is covered by Apple's privacy policy.
You can turn sync off again at any time in the same place, and use Remove Downloaded Originals… to free space on a device. The sync guide explains previews, originals and what syncs.
Agents, Shortcuts and Spotlight
A few features touch other software, so it's worth being exact about them:
- Agents (MCP) on the Mac are off by default. If you turn them on in Settings › Agents, an AI assistant can use your library through a local connection on your Mac; Raw Smith opens no network port. What the assistant reads, including previews of your photos, goes to the AI service that assistant uses, under that service's terms. Raw Smith never sends it to us, and agents never receive your original RAW files. Leave agents off and none of this happens.
- Shortcuts and Spotlight run on your device through Apple's frameworks.
The beta: what TestFlight shares
Raw Smith is in public beta on TestFlight, and honesty about that matters here. The app itself still sends nothing. TestFlight, though, is Apple's beta service, and Apple's TestFlight privacy page says that when you test a beta app, your crash logs and usage information are collected by Apple and shared with the developer, and you can't opt out. Any feedback you send through TestFlight reaches the developer too. Our privacy policy says the same.
If you join with the sign-up form on this site, your email address goes straight to Apple's App Store Connect so that Apple can send the invite. We don't store it anywhere else. Apple lists it in App Store Connect as a tester, and we may use it to ask for feedback and share updates. To stop, leave the beta in the TestFlight app or email us.
Once Raw Smith is on the App Store, TestFlight's collection no longer applies. Crash reports from App Store apps reach developers only if you turn on sharing with app developers in your device's Analytics settings, as Apple's developer help describes.
This website
rawsmith.app is a static site hosted on Cloudflare, which processes requests, such as IP addresses, to deliver and protect it. The site sets no cookies and uses no analytics. Fonts come from Google Fonts, which receives your IP address when it serves them. The full details are in the privacy policy.
The trade-offs of no cloud
Keeping everything on your devices has costs, and you should know them before you choose it:
- Backups are yours to manage. With sync off, nothing leaves the device. Back up your RAWs with Time Machine or another backup on the Mac, or copy them from the Files app on iPhone and iPad.
- Deleting the app deletes its library and previews from that device. On the Mac, originals you imported from Finder are never touched. On iPhone and iPad the copied RAWs live in the app's folder, so copy them somewhere first.
- No share links or web galleries. To share, you export a JPEG or HEIC and send it however you like.
- Edits stay in Raw Smith. XMP sidecars take ratings, labels, keywords and captions to other apps, but not develop settings.
Other editors without an account
If you're on a computer, open-source editors such as darktable and RawTherapee run without any account and are worth a look, especially on Windows or Linux, where Raw Smith doesn't run. Apple's own Photos also edits RAWs, and iCloud Photos is optional there too, though it edits the JPEG of a RAW+JPEG pair unless you switch it.
Where Raw Smith fits
Raw Smith is for people who want a full RAW editor and library on iPhone, iPad and Mac without signing up for anything: profiles, masks, noise reduction, culling and export, all on the device, with sync only through your own iCloud if you want it. It doesn't do generative remove, face recognition or tethering, and it doesn't run on Windows.
Raw Smith is a free download with a free tier and a 14-day trial; Pro is a one-time purchase or a yearly plan. It's in public beta on TestFlight for iPhone, iPad and Mac.
Questions
Is there a RAW photo editor that doesn't need an account?
Yes. Raw Smith for iPhone, iPad and Mac has no account of its own and no server: you download it from the App Store and start editing. On the desktop, open-source editors such as darktable and RawTherapee also work without an account.
Can I turn off cloud sync in Lightroom mobile completely?
Not according to Adobe's community experts: in Lightroom mobile you can pause sync but not disable it, because syncing to Adobe's cloud is central to how the app works.
Does Raw Smith upload my photos anywhere?
Only if you turn on iCloud sync, and then only to your own private iCloud database, in your own iCloud storage. Raw Smith has no server of its own and can't see your library.
Do Raw Smith's AI masks send photos to a server?
No. Subject, sky, people, face and object masks, and the culling hints, are made with Apple's Vision framework on your device. Nothing is uploaded to make them.
Does the TestFlight beta collect any data?
The app itself collects nothing. TestFlight is Apple's, and Apple says it collects crash logs and usage information from beta apps and shares them with the developer, with no opt-out. That ends with the App Store release, where crash reports reach developers only if you choose to share them.