Albums missing or moving in iOS 18 photos app

Moving Albums in IOS 18.1 does not work 90% of the time.

when you release the album it looks like it’s going to be in the new location then it disappears.

when I check the old location, there it is.

It’s terrible that it doesn’t work almost all of the time. Clearly Apple has zero testing or QC in their dev org

Also, why can’t you create a new album for selected photos within a nested folder like you used to? It’s totally unintuitive to have to create one at the top level of directories only to not be able to move the new album into a nested folder because the move function fails most of the time

I have bought more Apple products than anyone I know (at least 50 computers) and these OS updates keep getting worse

Google is way better at adding features to Android

I set my phone to stop syncing. I don't need further issues. I bought a good drive to remove all docs and pics from phone except contact pics and background pic

I agree with all the comments made. This is a disaster for me. I have built up a well organised library based carefully on albums and all that work has been savaged. Could someone from apple tell us why they have done this? And how we can get our albums back? Or can I simply delete iOS 18 and reinstall 17? What on earth change a really good system and without any consultation with your users fraternity?

It's actually really easy. I wrote overly detailed instructions in the rare event someone has never sync'ed with their PC or Mac before but most people should find it easy. Takes less than 10 mins even with over 5k photos like I have that I'm sync'ing from my PC due to work. I have talked to Apple and they don't consider it an issue at this point (thus in their minds there is nothing to fix). They think it makes it easier for people if they use their Mac or PC to sort their albums the way I did. And I admit, once you do it the albums ARE easier to use than they used to be, would have been nice though if they had made it more obvious the correct steps to set it up. I told them I had to figure it out myself and that was annoying because took some trial and errror and the first couple of people I spoke with didn't even know you could do what I did. I didn't find anyone who understood how I did it until I got escellated to Tier 3 support and even then the girl was like "oh, that's even easier than how I have been telling people". I told her well it wasn't for me because it took me a lot of trial and error playing with it one evening but I was glad she liked it and she said she'd start telling people to do it my way because it was easier than hers and would submit it as a known solution for people with the question.

Odd when customers figure it out better than the higest level of tech support.

I have good news! After 2 weeks of being in perpetual "sync mode", last night my photos finally fully synced. It took 1 day to fully optimize after they fully synced, and now my photos app is back to normal. I have albums and people back!!! I read somewhere that it could take weeks to fully sync. I did not want to believe that since I have really good upload and download speeds, but I guess it was true... In any event, I am happy that it fully resolved itself.

So true. I have over 40000 photos in my phone and I can’t even search them now..Worst thing is favourites album not showing in WhatsApp anymore! Am I supposed to search my whole gallery which has over 40000 photos when I want to post on which I took years ago?

This is the worst update ever! Photos looks so messy I can’t find anything anywhere anymore

Apple you have crucified absolutely crucified my albums that took weeks months and years to organise how dare you mess up my albums? This is the worst mistake you have ever made iOS 18. It is an absolute rum sack. It’s Rumack my whole phone what an utter utter pathetic joke for Theso-called world leading in technology. You’re an absolute Bimal rectify it with an immediate effect. So-called world leading in technology. You’re an absolute Bimal rectify it with a immediate effect because you are cause you’ve damaged all my business photos that took ages organising along with all my other photographs find a fixed fast because everyone’s up in arms about the mess you’ve caused thank you

The new IOS photo app is so bad, I am going to move everything to Android, as its so bad... I have lost so many years of photo's, after 7 new iPhones, multiple iMac's etc never a problem. Bought a watch ultra 2, ended up having to update IOS on phone to 18. and it has cause a total nightmare!!!! it would be cheaper to just buy a Microsoft laptop and copy it all across and sort it out that way, than the time required to sort out this complete and total abortion of an app!!!... absolutely threaders!!!! apple can good FOOK themselves!!!!

Agreed. Why, Apple, would you mess with people’s memories? Having my family folders, kid’s first day at school, now-dead granparents, etc sorted into MY personal folders is infinitely more important than some AI editing. The AI features should be optional. Everyones long-ago created folders of family love and important moments must be considered untouchable. Please fix ASAP!!

koruenxx wrote:

Agreed. Why, Apple, would you mess with people’s memories? Having my family folders, kid’s first day at school, now-dead granparents, etc sorted into MY personal folders is infinitely more important than some AI editing. The AI features should be optional. Everyones long-ago created folders of family love and important moments must be considered untouchable. Please fix ASAP!!

Apple doesn't read here in this user-to-user forum for feedback or suggestions. You can, however, let them know your thoughts here:

Product Feedback - Apple

I have certainly provided my feedback. Of course, I told them how much I like the update.

Terrible 18 upgrade based on photo albums …. Missing my albums

It’s a catastrophic update and REALLY the worst update ever 😡

I agree that Apple should address this nightmare. Apple had marketed there phone as such fabulous cameras so why are they messing with what so many people use their phones for. I was set on ordering an iPhone 16 pro but slammed on the brakes after I read about this. I have over 9000 photos that are stored on my phone for various reasons as well as documenting dates and issues. If I update to ISO18, from what I have read, it will be virtually impossible to find them. I wish Apple would address this issue and give a resolution and also can't understand why they don't put a warning about losing all of your albums and work of many years.

Maybe I misunderstand the issue and if so please put my mind to rest somebody. Otherwise I will stay with IOS 17.7 until forced to update to 18.0.

I read your fix but honestly, do you really expect people to have to go through all of that. People have bought Apple products because they just plain work. I moved away from PC’s and Microsoft years ago because of problems . Apple has always had a product that is easy to use and in my mind flawless . I am pretty darn good with computers but obviously not good enough to follow your steps. You are more advanced and capable.

I don’t use iCloud for my photos and also don’t sync photos between my ipad, MacBook or the iPhone . I tried to air drop the photos most needed to the MacBook but it too didn’t work I guess because of the fact it was over 200 photos. This is an album needed to remain in chronological order or else it is useless .

Am I understanding this situation correctly? Maybe I am completely wrong? If I update to ISO 18 will I regret it and lose all of my albums?

For example , I have albums of aircraft, boats, beaches, accidents , sharks , medical records, and on and on which all have important chronological records. Is that going to all be gone and unable to recover in the order they were taken if I upgrade to IOS 18?

Thanks for taking to time to advise me !!

I personally don't care if they do or not, it all depends on if they want their albums back like they was before or if they want to hold out hope that Apple changes their mind (which might never even happen) and that their wait is not in vain. Or they could spent 10 mins to do what it takes to fix it now and move on.

You sound like me though with your layout and needs; I have 5000+ photos (not counting personal ones) of technical info sync'ed from my PC which are organized into albums which are sorted by the model number (in many cases the model number IS the album name) of devices I have designed and/or worked on over the past 25 years and I am on government contract so people can call me if the need technical assistance and I need to be able to go right to the model they're working on, enter that album and then quickly find the schematic, set of instructions, operating steps or whatever to get them back up and running ASAP and I for one simply did not have time to wait to see if Apple decides to fix this or not. While finding the steps was a pain, once you know them (why I posted them step by step in extreme detail) it only takes 10 or so minutes and not I'm actually finding the new layout easier to find things than before. It was just getting it setup right was the part that was a PITA and I was just trying to save others all that trial and error.

But as I said, it's all personal if someone wants to hold out hope that Apple fixes it, or just bite the bullet and fix it themselves and be done. I provided steps on one way that a large number of us now know works, not saying it's the only way but we know this way works for sure for anyone who wants to do it and doesn't have time to play around with it themselves.

A old wise man once said:

"I discovered after many years thinking back on my life that everytime I wished for someone to bring me fish to eat for dinner, that I never once got any fish. But all the times I wished myself out of bed in the morning to go fishing, I never once failed to have fish to eat for dinner that evening."