What are HiDPI and Retina displays?
HiDPI and Apple Retina displays are displays which have a greater number of pixels per inch than traditional monitors. Some displays are so dense you can’t detect individual pixels with the naked eye. To support these monitors, Photoshop responds to the scale factor setup in your operating system preferences. The larger the scale factor in your system preferences, the larger Photoshop scales the user interface. This allows the user to adjust the size of the user interface and provide crisp text.
Support and Requirements
Version Support
Currently supported versions of Photoshop.
Monitor Resolution
Photoshop supports a minimum screen resolution of 1024 x 768 at 100% user interface scaling. The minumum screen resolution needs to increase as the UI scaling factor is increased. For example, you would need a screen resolution of 1920 x 1080 to scale comfortably to 150% or a screen resolution of 2880 x 1800 to scale comfortably to 200%.
See System Requirements for complete minimum technical specifications to run and use Photoshop.
Changing your resolution settings
macOS
Photoshop offers full support on HiDPI hardware, including the Retina Display available on the current MacBook Pro.
Photoshop adjusts its resolution based on your macOS Displays System Preferences:
- In macOS, select System Preferences > Displays. Now, under Display, choose either Default for display or Scaled to select a resolution setting. See Apple Support for Change your Mac display’s resolution.
In multi-monitor environments on macOS, dragging a window from a HiDPI Retina screen to a non-HiDPI monitor automatically adjusts the window scaling. The behavior helps avoid an overly large window and avoid excessive redraw.
Windows 10
Photoshop offers a full range of choices for UI scaling—from 100% through 400% in 25% increments.
Photoshop adjusts its resolution based on your Windows settings:
- In Windows, select Start > Settings > System > Display. Now, under Scale And Layout, choose a scaling factor for each of your displays. See Microsoft Support for View display settings in Windows 10.
In addition, you can adjust per-monitor scaling across monitors with different scaling factors. This flexibility ensures that a high resolution (HiDPI) laptop works seamlessly alongside a lower-resolution desktop monitor, or vice versa. For example, one of your monitors can have a scale factor of 175%, while another monitor can have a scale factor of 400%. So, you can choose either the highest-end 13-inch laptops with 4k screens, the more affordable 1080p models, or tap into 8k desktop monitors, and still have an uncompromised experience within Photoshop.
On Windows 10, the UI Scaling setting in Photoshop Photoshop Preferences > Interface > UI Scaling applies to some components, such as the File Info and some 3rd party plug-ins.
When the UI Scaling option is set to Auto, scaling defaults to the value closest to the primary monitor's OS scaling factor—100% or 200%.
Windows 7
On Windows 7, the UI Scaling setting in Photoshop Preferences > Interface > UI Scaling all of Photoshop's user interface. When the UI Scaling option is set to Auto, scaling defaults to the value closest to the primary monitor's OS scaling factor—100% or 200%.
Viewing your images
Editing your images on a HiDPI display will make your images appear sharper; however, your images will display smaller. View your images at 200% to make the preview larger (choose View > 200%).
New or changed commands
- Actual Pixels is now 100% in the View menu, Zoom Tool Options panel, and Keyboard Shortcuts dialog box.
- The View menu now contains 200%.
New shortcuts
- Cmd + double-click (macOS) or Ctrl + double-click (Win) the Zoom tool icon to zoom the current window to 200%.
- Shift + Cmd + double-click (macOS) or Shift + Ctrl + double-click (Win) the Zoom tool icon to zoom all windows to 200%.
- Canvas context menu now includes 200% when using the Zoom tool or Hand tool.
- You can assign a custom shortcut to View > 200% by choosing Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts to open the Keyboard Shortcuts dialog box.
Photoshop CS6 (macOS only)
HiDPI Retina support was added to Photoshop 6 (version 13.0.2) for macOS perpetual license customers. Camera Raw 8.1 adds HiDPI support under Photoshop CS6 as well.
Is HiDPI support provided for versions of Photoshop earlier than Photoshop CS6?
No, there are no plans to provide HiDPI support for versions of Photoshop earlier than Photoshop CS6.
