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Sorting People in Photos

I've looked and searched, but I'm unable to find a way to sort People in the Photos app. Other than moving people around manually, or favoriting them and them unfavoriting them in alpha order. Under the View menu -> sort only shows a greyed-out "by oldest first." I have more than 300 people in my 160,000 Photos library. Thx!

iMac, macOS 10.13

Posted on Feb 14, 2023 12:28 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Feb 14, 2023 2:20 PM

May it be suggested the User open the Photo Application..


Go to Help for Photos and type " Sort "


With a Library " 160,000 Photos library " - this process could some time to perform a complete scan.


To speed up this process, perhaps keep the computer connected to Power Over Night and configured it Not to Sleep.


Excerpt is what I am getting


When you first open Photos, it scans your library to identify people in your photos. After the scan is done, you can open the People album, view photos organized by the faces in them, and assign names to the people Photos found. As you import new photos into your library, Photos matches any people in them to the people you’ve identified. You can also identify the people in your photos manually.

Open Photos for me

View people in your library

  1. In the Photos app on your Mac, click People in the sidebar.
  2. Note: If you use iCloud Shared Photo Library, you must choose Both Libraries from the Library pop-up menu in the toolbar to see People in the sidebar.
  3. To have faces appear sorted alphabetically by name, choose View > Sort > By Name, then choose View > Sort > Ascending or View > Sort > Descending.
  4. People that you mark as favorites appear in large squares at the top of the window. To make a person a favorite, click the Favorite button on the photo. You can also drag someone into or out of the favorites area at the top.
  5. Tip: When you see an unnamed face in the window, you can position the pointer over the face, click Name, then enter a name.
  6. Double-click a face to see the photos of that person.
  7. To see entire photos or only faces, click the Photos or Faces button in the toolbar. To see all of a person’s photos or just a selection, click Show More or Show All at the top of the Photos area.
  8. To add a name to a person’s photos, click Add Name in the toolbar, enter a name (or choose a name that appears as you type), click Next, then click Done.
  9. All the photos in the group are assigned the name. If a person is misidentified, you can change it by clicking it in the toolbar.
  10. Do any of the following:
  • View photos on a map: Scroll down to Places, then double-click a photo thumbnail to see the location where the photo was taken.
    • Confirm additional photos of a person: When Photos identifies additional photos of a person, you can review them and confirm that the correct name is applied. Scroll down below Places, then click Confirm Additional Photos. When a photo of the person appears, click Yes to confirm the person’s identity or No to indicate that this is not the person. Click Done to stop reviewing possible photos of the person.
    • Add or remove a person from Favorites: Scroll down below Places, then click Add This Person to Favorites or Remove [name] from Favorites.
  • Remove a person from the People album: Scroll down below Places, then click Remove [name] from People.
    • When you remove a person from the People album, the original photos aren’t removed from your library.
    • Create a memory using photos of a person: Scroll down below Places, then click Create Photo Memory. A new memory about this person appears in Memories.
    • See fewer photos of this person: If you prefer not to see photos of a person in your People album, scroll down below Places, then click “Feature [name] less.” Photos of this person will appear less often in Memories and in the People album. To change this setting, choose Photos > Settings, click General, then click Reset Suggested People.
    • Select a photo as the “key photo” to represent all photos of a person: While viewing thumbnails of the person, Control-click a photo, then choose Make Key Photo.

Combine photos of a person into one group

If you find more than one group of photos that identify the same person, you can combine the groups.

  1. In the Photos app on your Mac, click People in the sidebar.
  2. Select the groups of photos that you want to combine.
  3. Control-click one group, then choose Merge [number] People.

Manually identify and name people in a photo

Some photos may contain people who are not automatically named. You can name them manually.

  1. In the Photos app on your Mac, double-click a photo to open it.
  2. Do one of the following:
    • Choose View > Show Face Names. Click the name (or click “unnamed”) under a face, type a name, then press Return (or choose a name that appears as you type).
  • Click the Info button in the toolbar. Click the Add button , drag the circle to position it over the face if necessary, click the Name field, type a name, then press Return.
    • You can click the Add button multiple times to identify multiple faces in a photo. To remove a name that you added to a face, click the Remove button on the person.

To stop showing face names in photos, choose View > Hide Face Names.


3 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Feb 14, 2023 2:20 PM in response to Thomasaab

May it be suggested the User open the Photo Application..


Go to Help for Photos and type " Sort "


With a Library " 160,000 Photos library " - this process could some time to perform a complete scan.


To speed up this process, perhaps keep the computer connected to Power Over Night and configured it Not to Sleep.


Excerpt is what I am getting


When you first open Photos, it scans your library to identify people in your photos. After the scan is done, you can open the People album, view photos organized by the faces in them, and assign names to the people Photos found. As you import new photos into your library, Photos matches any people in them to the people you’ve identified. You can also identify the people in your photos manually.

Open Photos for me

View people in your library

  1. In the Photos app on your Mac, click People in the sidebar.
  2. Note: If you use iCloud Shared Photo Library, you must choose Both Libraries from the Library pop-up menu in the toolbar to see People in the sidebar.
  3. To have faces appear sorted alphabetically by name, choose View > Sort > By Name, then choose View > Sort > Ascending or View > Sort > Descending.
  4. People that you mark as favorites appear in large squares at the top of the window. To make a person a favorite, click the Favorite button on the photo. You can also drag someone into or out of the favorites area at the top.
  5. Tip: When you see an unnamed face in the window, you can position the pointer over the face, click Name, then enter a name.
  6. Double-click a face to see the photos of that person.
  7. To see entire photos or only faces, click the Photos or Faces button in the toolbar. To see all of a person’s photos or just a selection, click Show More or Show All at the top of the Photos area.
  8. To add a name to a person’s photos, click Add Name in the toolbar, enter a name (or choose a name that appears as you type), click Next, then click Done.
  9. All the photos in the group are assigned the name. If a person is misidentified, you can change it by clicking it in the toolbar.
  10. Do any of the following:
  • View photos on a map: Scroll down to Places, then double-click a photo thumbnail to see the location where the photo was taken.
    • Confirm additional photos of a person: When Photos identifies additional photos of a person, you can review them and confirm that the correct name is applied. Scroll down below Places, then click Confirm Additional Photos. When a photo of the person appears, click Yes to confirm the person’s identity or No to indicate that this is not the person. Click Done to stop reviewing possible photos of the person.
    • Add or remove a person from Favorites: Scroll down below Places, then click Add This Person to Favorites or Remove [name] from Favorites.
  • Remove a person from the People album: Scroll down below Places, then click Remove [name] from People.
    • When you remove a person from the People album, the original photos aren’t removed from your library.
    • Create a memory using photos of a person: Scroll down below Places, then click Create Photo Memory. A new memory about this person appears in Memories.
    • See fewer photos of this person: If you prefer not to see photos of a person in your People album, scroll down below Places, then click “Feature [name] less.” Photos of this person will appear less often in Memories and in the People album. To change this setting, choose Photos > Settings, click General, then click Reset Suggested People.
    • Select a photo as the “key photo” to represent all photos of a person: While viewing thumbnails of the person, Control-click a photo, then choose Make Key Photo.

Combine photos of a person into one group

If you find more than one group of photos that identify the same person, you can combine the groups.

  1. In the Photos app on your Mac, click People in the sidebar.
  2. Select the groups of photos that you want to combine.
  3. Control-click one group, then choose Merge [number] People.

Manually identify and name people in a photo

Some photos may contain people who are not automatically named. You can name them manually.

  1. In the Photos app on your Mac, double-click a photo to open it.
  2. Do one of the following:
    • Choose View > Show Face Names. Click the name (or click “unnamed”) under a face, type a name, then press Return (or choose a name that appears as you type).
  • Click the Info button in the toolbar. Click the Add button , drag the circle to position it over the face if necessary, click the Name field, type a name, then press Return.
    • You can click the Add button multiple times to identify multiple faces in a photo. To remove a name that you added to a face, click the Remove button on the person.

To stop showing face names in photos, choose View > Hide Face Names.


Feb 15, 2023 1:29 AM in response to Thomasaab

Thomasaab wrote:

I've looked and searched, but I'm unable to find a way to sort People in the Photos app. Other than moving people around manually, or favoriting them and them unfavoriting them in alpha order. Under the View menu -> sort only shows a greyed-out "by oldest first." I have more than 300 people in my 160,000 Photos library. Thx!


After reviewing your above Bold Text in above and looking at my Photos Labeled by Person - that is the method as obscure it is .


Good Work 👍

Sorting People in Photos

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