How to take a sharp close-up of your iris with an iPhone

The short answer: soft daylight from the side, the phone about 2 cm from your eye on an iPhone with a macro camera, eye wide open, and no bright lamp or window straight in front of you. Most blurry or flat iris shots come from too much distance, too little light, or a big reflection over the pupil.

Why irises are hard to photograph

Your iris is only about 12 mm across. From a normal selfie distance it covers a tiny part of the frame, so even a 48-megapixel photo has only a few hundred pixels of real iris detail. The fine fibres, crypts and the ring around the pupil need you to get close, and close is where phones struggle to focus.

Use the macro camera if you have one

iPhone 13 Pro and later Pro models, and iPhone 16 and later, switch to the ultra-wide camera's macro mode when you get close. That lens focuses at about 2 cm, which is what makes the pattern of your iris visible. On other iPhones, hold the phone as close as it will still focus (around 10 cm) and crop in afterwards; you'll get less detail, but a sharp, well-lit shot still works.

Light: soft, from the side

• Face a window at an angle, in daylight, rather than straight on. Side light shows the texture of the iris instead of flattening it.
• Avoid ring lights and lamps right in front of you: they put a bright circle over your pupil.
• Don't use the flash. It's far too harsh this close.

Every reflection in your eye ends up in the photo, phone and hand included. irisma takes them out of the portrait, but it can't see what a reflection hides: a big one over the pupil covers the most interesting part, so keep it small and near the edge.

Hold still and let it focus

• Open your eye wide. Gently lifting the upper lid with a finger shows the whole iris.
• Rest your elbows on a table, or ask a friend to take the photo.
• Take a few shots in a row and keep the sharpest. At 2 cm, a tiny movement is enough to blur it.

Check before you keep it

Zoom in on the photo. You should see fine lines running out from the pupil like spokes. If the iris looks smooth, it's out of focus or too far away: move a little closer and try again.

Let the app do the fiddly part

irisma finds your eye on the screen, taps gently faster as you get closer, and takes the photo by itself when the iris is sharp and big enough — then keeps the sharpest of three. If a photo still isn't good enough, it tells you why before you spend anything.