# Topaz Photo v1.6.0 — Topaz Photo v1.6.0 - Recover Faces 3, Sharpen - Noise-Aware, & NeuroServer Model Speed Ups

- Product: Topaz Photo (https://whatsnew.fyi/product/topaz-photo)
- Vendor: Topaz Labs
- Date: 2026-05-14
- Version: v1.6.0
- Original notes: https://community.topazlabs.com/t/topaz-photo-v1-6-0-recover-faces-3-sharpen-noise-aware-neuroserver-model-speed-ups/102790
- Permalink: https://whatsnew.fyi/product/topaz-photo/releases/v1.6.0
- Labels: Platforms: Windows, macOS

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Reuse: the summaries, labels and curation here are © What's New. Quote freely with attribution and a link back; wholesale republication of the corpus is not permitted — terms: https://whatsnew.fyi/terms. The vendors' own release notes remain their publishers'.

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Hello everyone! A new release for Topaz Photo, with two new models and a significant speed improvement for many NeuroServer-based models. Recover Faces 3 — Portrait Quality Face Recovery Sharpen - Noi…

- **added** — Add Recover Faces 3 model for portrait quality face recovery with no size limit and elimination of dot artifacts at high strength levels
- **added** — Add Sharpen - Noise-Aware model that separates noise from detail before sharpening to preserve image texture and grain
- **changed** — Improve NeuroServer model speed by over 300% for Wonder 3, Super Focus v3, and Denoise Max
- **removed** — Sunset Recover Faces 1 model

Hello everyone!
A new release for Topaz Photo, with two new models and a significant speed improvement for many NeuroServer-based models.
- Recover Faces 3 — Portrait Quality Face Recovery
- Sharpen - Noise-Aware — Sharpen Detail, Not Noise
- NeuroServer Model Speed Improvements — Over 300% Faster
You can find the installer links and the full changelog below for this version of Topaz Photo. For any issues, make sure to send us an email to support@topazlabs.com
v1.6.0
Released May 13th, 2026
Windows: [Download](https://downloads.topazlabs.com/deploy/TopazPhoto/1.6.0/TopazPhoto-1.6.0.msi)
Snapdragon: [Download](https://downloads.topazlabs.com/deploy/TopazPhoto/1.6.0/TopazPhoto-arm64-1.6.0.msi)
Apple Silicon Mac: [Download](https://downloads.topazlabs.com/deploy/TopazPhoto/1.6.0/TopazPhoto-1.6.0-arm64.pkg)
Intel Mac: [Download](https://downloads.topazlabs.com/deploy/TopazPhoto/1.6.0/TopazPhoto-1.6.0-x86_64.pkg)
Recover Faces 3 — Portrait Quality Face Recovery
Recover Faces 2 had two problems that limited how useful it was for many images.
The first was a hard size limit. Recover Faces 2 has a maximum output size of 512x512 pixels. Faces larger than that are forced to the smaller size, losing detail and sharpness. Faces that needed recovery would look smooth and out of place when compared to the rest of the image. Our recommendation was to avoid using it entirely in these situations.
The second was dot artifacts that appeared at high strength levels, exactly when you’d need strong recovery the most. On blurry or low quality faces, a strong face recovery is needed, but artifacts would make the result unusable.
Recover Faces 3 fixes both these issues to expand when the enhancement can be used.
The size limit is gone. Recover Faces 3 sharpens and recovers soft detail on faces of any size, producing sharp, portrait-quality output regardless of how large the face is in the frame. This image has a large face with soft details. There is room for improvement, but the existing Recover Faces 2 model would not create an acceptable output.
Using Recover Faces 2, the freckles are reduced significantly. The eyes are softened instead of improved. Eyebrow hairs are blended together as well.
Meanwhile, Recover Faces 3 is able to sharpen the eyes, improve the skin, and enhance the eyebrows too. It’s far better suited for high quality outputs.
The dot artifact issue is resolved. You can push strength as high as the image calls for without worrying about it. For low quality or heavily degraded faces, that means the model recovers those faces with high quality output.
The new model is a generative recover faces model that processes each face separately. Each additional face selected will increase processing time. For example, 4 similarly sized faces will take 4x the time compared to 1 face of the same size.
For faces already with decent quality and below the 512x512 pixel limit, Recover Faces 2 will still do the job and process faster. For large faces, blurry faces, or anything degraded enough that Recover Faces 2 struggled, 3 is the better starting point. and the quality difference is worth the extra processing time.
Recover Faces 3 runs on NeuroServer and processes locally on NVIDIA, AMD, and Apple Silicon (macOS 14 or later). Cloud render is available for unsupported hardware, up to a maximum output size of 100MP.
Due to the lower quality of the older model, we are sunsetting Recover Faces 1.
Sharpen - Noise-Aware — Sharpen Detail, Not Noise
Photographers working on location don’t get to control their conditions. For wildlife, portrait, sports, and other types of photography you may be forced to shoot in low light, fast moments. The noise and grain in those captured moments is part of what makes your images come alive. Every sharpening model we’ve shipped until now treats that texture as a problem. Sharpening will enhance noise or grain to a distracting level, which means it must be removed before sharpening the underlying detail. In doing so you l

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