Which copyright fields should I fill in?

We suggest the creator, the copyright notice and the credit line, plus a web address for your terms. IPTC's minimal set lists those three too, along with a description, the copyright owner and the date created.

Where do I add copyright metadata in Lightroom Classic?

Adobe's page has you open Edit Presets from the Preset menu in the Metadata panel, fill in the fields, save the preset and apply it to your photos.

Can I add copyright metadata if I use Photoshop?

Yes, in Adobe Bridge. Adobe's help has you choose File > File Info , select Copyrighted on the Description tab and enter the owner, notice text and URL.

Can I add copyright metadata to a PNG or WebP?

Yes. Our tool writes EXIF and XMP into both. It writes IPTC into JPEG only, so the creator and copyright still sit in EXIF and XMP.

Will the metadata survive if I resize the photo?

Only if the program that resizes it copies the metadata. In our tests sharp and Pillow dropped all of it at default settings.

Is the file uploaded when I use your tool?

No. The tool runs in your browser and nothing is uploaded.

How to add copyright information to a photo's metadata

Fill in four fields: creator, copyright notice, credit line and a web address for your terms. In Lightroom Classic, save them as a metadata preset in the Edit Metadata Presets dialog and apply it to your photos. For a batch of JPEG, PNG or WebP files, Fix Watermark does it in your browser.

Published October 30, 2026. Drafted with AI assistance and checked against the sources linked on this page. How we write our guides.

Which fields to fill in

Four fields carry the information most people mean by "copyright on a photo". Their names here are the IPTC Photo Metadata Standard's, as IPTC's user guide uses them, and the copyright metadata tool writes all four:

Creator: who made the picture.
Copyright notice: the notice itself, for example a year and a name.
Credit line: the credit to print beside the picture.
Web statement of rights: a web address where your terms are published. The tool also has an optional Licensor URL, a web address where someone can ask for a licence.

Where each field is stored, and its length limits in the older IPTC format, are in the table in our guide to EXIF, IPTC and XMP.

IPTC's guide says the copyright notice should contain the name of the current copyright holder, and may include the copyright symbol, the year of publication and terms such as "All Rights Reserved". For how to word it, see our guide to a copyright notice for photos.

The web statement of rights is a web address for a page that states who owns the picture and how it may be used. IPTC's user guide says Adobe's File Info panel calls this field Copyright Info URL. Google reads these fields too: its image metadata page recommends keeping the IPTC creator, credit line and copyright notice, and says the web statement of rights is required for the licensable badge. Google adds that it does not promise that structured data or IPTC metadata will show in search results.

How to add copyright metadata in Lightroom Classic

Adobe's page on metadata presets describes a dialog with an IPTC Copyright group, which writes the copyright holder's name, the usage rights and the holder's web address, and a separate IPTC Creator group for the author's name, address, contact details, website and job title. The page names no version. In Lightroom Classic on Windows or Mac (steps as Adobe lists them, checked October 2026):

From the Preset menu in the Metadata panel, choose Edit Presets. The dialog is also under Metadata > Edit Metadata Presets.
Fill in the fields you want, such as those in the IPTC Copyright group, and tick their boxes. Check All, Check None and Check Filled tick boxes in bulk.
Choose Preset > Save Current Settings As New Preset, type a name for the preset, and click Create.
Click Done.
In the Grid view, select your photos and choose the preset from the Preset menu in the Metadata panel.

Adobe's page does not say whether applying a preset overwrites a value that a photo already has, so look at one photo afterwards.

Lightroom Classic keeps metadata in its catalog. Adobe's metadata basics page says that for JPEG, TIFF, PSD and DNG files the XMP metadata is written into the files (camera raw files get a sidecar file instead). Tick Automatically Write Changes Into XMP in Catalog Settings to have it written as you work, or choose Metadata > Save Metadata To File(s) (Ctrl+S on Windows, Command+S on Mac) to write it by hand. When you export, the Metadata section of the export dialog decides what travels in the copy, according to Adobe's export page. Its choices are Copyright Only, Copyright & Contact Info Only, All Except Camera Raw & Camera Info and All; they are not available for DNG files. The page says Copyright Only includes only IPTC Copyright metadata and does not list which fields that covers, so check a sample export if you rely on the creator field.

How to add copyright metadata for Photoshop users: Adobe Bridge

Adobe's Bridge help says metadata is stored in XMP, the standard on which Adobe Bridge and Adobe Photoshop are built, and that XMP facilitates the exchange of metadata between Adobe applications. Bridge offers two ways to edit it, the File Info dialog box and the Metadata panel, and a property may be labelled Author in one view and Creator in another (About metadata, page last updated August 18, 2026). We suggest Photoshop users type the copyright fields in Bridge. In Adobe Bridge, using File Info (no version stated; steps as Adobe's page lists them, checked October 2026):

Select one or more files.
Choose File > File Info.
On the Description tab, select Copyrighted from the Copyright Status pop-up menu.
Enter the copyright owner, the notice text and the URL of the person or company holding the copyright.
Select OK to apply the changes.

With several files selected, Adobe says anything you enter in a field overrides existing metadata and applies the new value to all of them.

The Metadata panel is the other route. In Adobe Bridge (steps as Adobe's page lists them, checked October 2026):

Select one or more files and view their information in the Metadata panel.
Click the pencil icon at the far right of the metadata field you want to edit.
Type in the box to edit or add metadata, and press Tab to move through the fields.
Select the Apply button at the bottom of the panel, or Cancel to discard your changes.

When you export a copy from Photoshop, Adobe's Quick Export page, last updated February 23, 2026, says to select Quick Export Metadata in the Export preferences to include Copyright and Contact Info.

How to add metadata to many photos in your browser

The copyright metadata tool writes the same fields into JPEG, PNG and WebP files, one photo or a whole batch. In the Fix Watermark copyright metadata tool in a desktop or phone browser (steps checked October 2026):

Open the copyright metadata tool and add your photos with Drop photos here or choose photos.
Under Copyright information, fill in Creator (your name), Copyright notice, Credit line and Web statement of rights (web address). Licensor URL (web address), Contact email and Contact website (web address) are optional.
Check the Before and after table, which lists what each file says now and what it will say after saving.
Select Download, or Download ZIP for several files.

Free, no limit. Your pixels are not touched; only the metadata changes. Nothing is uploaded. In our measurements the tool kept 33 of 33 test fields and left the pixel data byte-identical.

The tool writes EXIF Artist and Copyright, XMP and, for JPEG, IPTC; a PNG or WebP gets EXIF and XMP only. If a file already names a different creator or copyright holder, the tool keeps that credit and shows an "Original credit kept" notice, unless you tick Replace a creator or copyright that is already in a file. Maker notes and embedded thumbnails are not carried over. Writing a notice into the file does not stop anyone copying the picture; a check of the file afterwards shows what it carries.

What survives later resizing and conversion

In our measurements on a JPEG, a PNG and a WebP tagged with 33 copyright fields in all, sharp 0.35.5 and Pillow 12.3.0 at their default options kept none of them on a resize to 50%, while sharp with its keepMetadata() option kept all 33. The table, the format-change results and how we measured are in our guide to EXIF, IPTC and XMP; we suggest writing the metadata as the last step before you share a file, or confirming that the program you resize with copies it.

Can I put copyright on my photos?

You can write a copyright notice into a photo's metadata, as above, and add a visible mark if you want one. What a notice does for your legal position is a separate question, which this page does not answer; our guide to a copyright notice for photos covers the US rules.

Sources

Checked October 30, 2026.

Questions

Which copyright fields should I fill in?: We suggest the creator, the copyright notice and the credit line, plus a web address for your terms. IPTC's minimal set lists those three too, along with a description, the copyright owner and the date created.
Where do I add copyright metadata in Lightroom Classic?: Adobe's page has you open Edit Presets from the Preset menu in the Metadata panel, fill in the fields, save the preset and apply it to your photos.
Can I add copyright metadata if I use Photoshop?: Yes, in Adobe Bridge. Adobe's help has you choose File > File Info, select Copyrighted on the Description tab and enter the owner, notice text and URL.
Can I add copyright metadata to a PNG or WebP?: Yes. Our tool writes EXIF and XMP into both. It writes IPTC into JPEG only, so the creator and copyright still sit in EXIF and XMP.
Will the metadata survive if I resize the photo?: Only if the program that resizes it copies the metadata. In our tests sharp and Pillow dropped all of it at default settings.
Is the file uploaded when I use your tool?: No. The tool runs in your browser and nothing is uploaded.