Photos/videos inaccessible

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Level 1

4 points

Photos/videos inaccessible

Basically what it says on the tin: my photos/videos are seemingly completely inaccessible. When I try to open the Photos app, the most it does is show the animation of the app opening but it never actually does, it simply crashes immediately or after a few seconds without ever actually showing my camera roll or any of my albums. All other apps (social media/photo editors/etc) where I'd usually be able to pull up my photos display nothing. I know it's not an iCloud issue (my camera roll is saved locally) and it's not an issue with app permissions either.

On my macbook, the Photos app says it's preparing to import for a moment before asking me to unlock my phone (which it is, with everything else on the device popping up fine), and Image Capture displays "Please wait. Photos in the camera roll of (my phone name) are being prepared" no matter how long I leave it up for. Phone settings says I have 0 photo/videos, but the storage space that my camera roll typically takes up hasn't been freed up (though where it normally took some time to calculate/display how much storage Photos was taking up, it now no longer actually displays that, and doesn't seem to be able to finish calculating category sizes either).

Only indication that there's actually anything there is that longpressing the Photos app icon will give the options that does display a thumbnail for the "Most Recent" image (which I know isn't the most recent image I'd saved). The photo preview in the bottom corner when you open the camera also still previews my camera roll (but shows a different pic than above), and while for a while it seemed to be displaying what actually was the most recent image, now it remains static no matter how many screenshots/pics I've taken to see if it will change. Did a phone backup and a quick clickthrough of those files too, and did see a few pictures I had, so there's still something in there somewhere.

I'm running 14.0.1 right now, so I can run an update to see if it fixes the issue, but the last time I tried an update while my phone was acting up, it froze up completely and had to be factory reset, so I'd like to see if there's any way to try and get to my camera roll first before doing that. I'm not sure if this last backup I ran actually grabbed everything, and in the grand scheme of things it's probably not a big deal since I'd last backed up my photos a few months before this, but if there's potentially a way forward without losing my most recent stuff I'd like to try that out before resetting anything.

iPhone SE

Posted on Jan 24, 2023 2:16 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

brbo

Level 8

35,843 points

Jan 25, 2023 3:19 PM in response to emlai

Hi emlai,

Welcome to the Apple (user-to-user) Community.

Seems to me (and I may be wrong) that your iPhone shows symptoms of not being able to operate smoothly because of lack of memory / storage space. The operating system needs free space in which to operate, especially with memory-intensive files like photos, so wondering if enough space is available.

Apple support has articles online that may be helpful.

How to check the storage on your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support

Tips on freeing up space:

What to do: If you need more space for an update on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support

and

What to do: If you're missing photos or videos in the Photos app - Apple Support

All the best :-)

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Answer 2

brbo

Level 8

35,843 points

Feb 1, 2023 10:09 PM in response to emlai

Re:

"Photos is pretty much the only thing not operating as norm on my phone right now"

and

" is there anything else that might cause/fix it"

See if Apple Support's article (link below) can help:

If an app on your iPhone or iPad stops responding, closes unexpectedly or won’t open – Apple Support

_________________________________________________________________

Re: "with about 7-8 GB of free space available out of 64 on my model".

Seems those GB are adequate for the iOS to operate, yet photos can be very memory-intensive on top of that. (Maybe iOS16 uses more than you are used to ?)

____________________________________________________________________

Re: "missing specific photos/videos"

If you gain access to "Photos"

Perhaps try searching for one of the missing photos, find one, and maybe find more.

Search for photos on iPhone – Apple Support

You could look for missing photos in the "Recently Deleted" folder:

ie: Go to Photos > Albums, and tap Recently Deleted in the Utilities section.

and

Look in: Hidden albums, your Shared Library, and iCloud Photos.

___________________________________________________________________

Wondering if it would be a good idea to back-up everything to a Mac or external device: (NB: wouldn't want to back-up the cause of the Photos problem though!)

Eg:

How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch with your Mac - Apple Support

or

How to back up your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iTunes on your PC - Apple Support

______________________________________

Another avenue to try:

You might want to reach out to the Photos Support Team:

There is a "Get Support" link (online chat, phone, eMail etc.) or an app link, at the bottom of their webpage:

Photos - Official Apple Support

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Answer 3

emlai Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 1, 2023 9:10 PM in response to brbo

Thanks for the reply! Photos is pretty much the only thing not operating as norm on my phone right now, with about 7-8 GB of free space available out of 64 on my model. I've had less free space on my phone before with Photos still working fine even when I had more media stored on my device, so would that much free space really not be enough for the app to even launch? Would that kind of issue also point to why even my laptop seems unable to pull up those photos and videos?

Assumed for a while that it might have been due to battery, because the only other thing not functioning lately has been Safari crashing my phone with a near full charge and rebooting near empty, but I just got my battery replaced and so far it's back to Photos now being the only thing acting up. It's not so much that I'm missing specific photos/videos, but that every avenue I've tried won't so much as acknowledge that Photos and anything that would usually be found there even exists on my phone. Would clearing further storage really be a way to try and get that to be pulled up, is there anything else that might cause/fix it, or at this stage should I just write off the last few months of media I didn't have backed up and try to update/reset my phone? Brought it up while I was getting my battery replaced and while they were otherwise very helpful, they didn't have any idea either what the issue might be so I don't know what else to try past this.

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Photos/videos inaccessible

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