Andersson, J. Curbis, F. Kotur, M. Lindau, F. Thorin, S. Werin, S. JACoW Geneva, Switzerland 978-3-95450-182-3 10.18429/JACoW-IPAC2017-TUPAB094 English 1533-1536 TUPAB094 emittance linac gun quadrupole laser Contribution to a conference proceedings 2017 2017-05 http://dx.doi.org/10.18429/JACoW-IPAC2017-TUPAB094 http://jacow.org/ipac2017/papers/tupab094.pdf The MAX IV injector design predicts a beam with 100 pC of charge and an emittance lower than 1 mm mrad. The photocathode pre-injector is based on the now close to standard 1.6-cell gun adapted to 2.9985 GHz, in combination with a Ti:Sapphire laser system. This system reaches the requirements of the injector operation for the SPF, but can be tuned beyond specifications to open up new operation modes. During 2016 and 2017 several aspects where investigated to improve the emittance from the current gun, the goal was to meet the SPF specifications. In this paper we report on the progress, discuss the steps taken leading to a final emittance of ~ 1 mm mrad and beyond.