You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

I am unable to load my pictures from my iPhone to my Mac, without individually airdropping. Please help transfer my pictures by connecting my phone to my computer. (I have tried and it doesn't seem toward. However, my husbands pictures can.)

I am unable to load my pictures from my iPhone to my Mac, without individually airdropping.

Please help transfer my pictures by connecting my phone to my computer. (I have tried and it has not worked. However, my husbands phone is able to connect and download his pictures quickly.)

iPhone XR, iOS 14

Posted on Dec 13, 2021 5:16 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Dec 13, 2021 5:19 PM

This article describes several methods→Copying personal photos and videos from iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to your computer. By far the easiest way is to use iCloud.

13 replies

Dec 19, 2021 2:56 PM in response to Lawrence Finch

I'm having the same problem. iPhoto on my Mac only allows a few select photos from my iPhone 12 to import. It doesn't recognize the format of the others. I have upgraded the operating system on the Mac (I'm not offered anything higher than 10.12.6 through the App store - I have seen someone else getting it to work with 10.13.4 I believe.) I can't find anyway to update iPhotos on my computer.

Dec 26, 2021 10:19 AM in response to Lawrence Finch

Nope! I have always had "Automatic" so that isn't it on my iPhone nor Mac. I spent over an hour on the phone with an Apple Tech looking at my computer from his side and what he told me didn't work either. There is NO reason for it to automatically quit transferring photos over to Mac this summer when it's done it since I first purchased a Mac and an iPhone. This is my second Mac and numerous iPhones.

So there has to be another answer. Please help~. thank you for your checking though!

Dec 27, 2021 7:59 AM in response to katfromcolo

Well, I can’t help any further, as I stopped using a cable several years ago, and now sync my photos to my Mac through iCloud. It requires no effort and no thinking. I take a picture, it is on my Mac, my iPad, and, with family sharing, my wife’s iPhone, her iPad and her Mac within a few seconds, completely automatically. I also sync photos to Google Photos, Dropbox and LiveDrive through their apps, again all without any human intervention (except for LiveDrive, where I have to open the app).

Jan 12, 2022 8:58 PM in response to another anon

Apple has replaced 'iPhoto' with the 'Photos' app, and an older Mac that's stuck with iPhoto is eventually not going to work with the newer versions of iOS. You may have reached that stage with a recent iOS update to the iPhone.

One solution might be to revert the phone to an older, iPhoto-compatible version of iOS - but I don't know how easy it is to do that.

iCloud is the simpler way, by far - IF you have decent Internet access. It's free for I think the first 5 GB, which is a boatload of photos. You can configure it so nothing but the Photos app is using it, and continue to sync/backup the phone via USB. Security should not be a worry: iCloud files are encrypted at your end prior to being uploaded, and they can't be read until they've been downloaded to a device that's using your password.

Feb 2, 2022 11:46 AM in response to another anon

I have faced exactly the same issue and upgraded my OS to 12.2 and iOS to 15.3 but still nothing, and until this week I never had had an issue. Wondered if it was something to do with my photo library being on a NAS Drive but could upload via Airplay (and even got one image to upload via USB cable when selected to just one image) but then nothing. But this trick resolved it. Going into Settings and Photos on the iPhone and then selecting "Keep Originals" fixed the problem (so far) so thanks for this. Clearly there is a glitch in Apple's iOS that needs fixing as the "Automatic" function is not working.


But thanks again, I had spent several hours scrolling the internet for solutions before finding this. The fix should be given more publicity but well done!

Feb 9, 2022 1:50 PM in response to LeighBarton

It's often the case that an iPhone setting gets hosed for no apparent reason. We have here one user who solved the problem by switching from "Automatic" to "Keep Originals" ... and another user who solved the problem by making the reverse switch. I think it's a case of one setting (or the other) being messed up, so that switching to the other solves the problem. You could probably switch back to the original setting, if it better serves your puposes, without re-creating the problem.

I am unable to load my pictures from my iPhone to my Mac, without individually airdropping. Please help transfer my pictures by connecting my phone to my computer. (I have tried and it doesn't seem toward. However, my husbands pictures can.)

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.