Black hole imaging provides a direct way to probe spacetime geometry in the strong-gravity regime, while possible quantum corrections to black hole images remain an important open issue. In this work, we investigate the holographic Einstein rings of Euler-Heisenberg anti-de Sitter (AdS) black holes, in which the gravitational background is coupled to the nonlinear electrodynamics induced by quantum electrodynamic vacuum polarization. Compared with the Reissner-Nordström-AdS case, the Euler-Heisenberg parameter introduces a controllable QED correction to the near-horizon geometry, making this system a useful theoretical laboratory for exploring how microscopic quantum-field effects may leave macroscopic signatures in black hole images. Within the AdS/CFT correspondence, the four-dimensional Euler-Heisenberg-AdS black hole is dual to a finite-temperature conformal field theory living on the three-dimensional boundary. We introduce a localized monochromatic Gaussian source on the boundary sphere and treat it as the boundary condition of a minimally coupled scalar probe field propagating in the bulk. By solving the Klein-Gordon equation in the black hole background with ingoing boundary conditions at the event horizon, we obtain the boundary response function of the dual scalar operator. The response function, which encodes the bulk wave propagation and scattering information, is then transformed into an observable image-plane intensity distribution by means of a virtual convex-lens optical system. This procedure reconstructs the holographic Einstein ring in a wave-optics framework.

Our numerical results show several clear physical effects. First, the image exhibits a frequency-dependent transition from wave optics to geometric optics. At low source frequency, diffraction dominates and the image appears as a diffuse bright spot. As the frequency increases, the diffuse structure gradually sharpens into a bright ring, and in the high-frequency regime the ring radius approaches the geometric-optics prediction. Second, the observer’s position strongly affects the image morphology. For an observer located on the symmetry axis, the image forms concentric Einstein rings. As the observer moves away from the axis, the ring degenerates into a bright arc and eventually into a localized bright spot, providing a holographic manifestation of the viewing-angle dependence of strong gravitational lensing. Third, the amplitude of the boundary response increases when the black hole charge decreases, indicating that the charge of the black hole modifies the scattering efficiency of the bulk wave. We further compare the holographic images with an independent geometric-optics analysis based on null geodesics. The photon sphere radius is obtained from the extremum condition of the effective potential, and the corresponding Einstein ring radius is calculated from the critical impact parameter at the AdS boundary. The holographic ring radius extracted in the high-frequency limit agrees very well with the null-geodesic prediction. For different values of the Euler-Heisenberg parameter and temperature, the relative deviation remains below one percent, confirming the reliability and self-consistency of the holographic imaging method. In particular, increasing the QED correction parameter monotonically decreases both the photon sphere radius and the Einstein ring radius. This demonstrates that the nonlinear electrodynamic correction leaves a measurable imprint on the holographic image. These results show that holographic wave-optics imaging can capture not only the geometric photon-ring structure of black holes but also the effects of QED-induced nonlinear corrections to the bulk spacetime. The present study provides a boundary-field-theory perspective on how quantum corrections in the gravitational bulk may be inferred from optical response data, and it offers a useful theoretical framework for distinguishing modified black hole geometries through their lensing images. Although the AdS setup is not a direct model of asymptotically flat astrophysical black holes, it provides a controlled arena in which wave effects, strong gravity, and quantum electrodynamic corrections can be studied in a unified way.