My Photo Stream not updating in Mac Photos app?

Posted by Ant on September 13th, 2015 at 12:50 PM | 145 Comments

Apple’s new Photos app for Mac may suddenly stop automatically importing images from My Photo Stream. That means photos from your iPhone and iPad aren’t making their way onto your Mac like you would expect. Here’s how to make My Photo Stream start syncing to Photos again.

Apple released Photos for Mac as a replacement for iPhoto earlier this year. For most people, the transition was smooth and Photos has been a great upgrade to a much more modern and streamlined app. After using the new app for several months without issue, I recently ran into a problem that prevented my iPhone photos from showing up on my Mac. It seemed to start a couple weeks ago, as I noticed my most recent pictures were missing from the Photos library. I hadn’t changed any settings to cause it – Photo Stream was just suddenly not working on my Mac anymore.

If you’re experiencing this issue and want to get My Photo Stream to start working on your Mac again, the fix should be easy. But first, confirm that My Photo Stream is enabled on your Mac by going to the Photos app, then Photos > Preferences in the menu bar. Click the iCloud tab and ensure the My Photo Stream box is checked. Second, confirm the same on your iPhone or iPad by going to Settings > iCloud > Photos. The My Photo Stream option should be turned on there. If both of these are already set correctly, follow the steps below:

On your Mac, quit the Photos app.
Launch the Activity Monitor app, which is located under Utilities in the Applications folder.
In Activity Monitor, search for “photos” in the upper-right to filter through the list of running processes.
There should be a few rows left on the screen. For “Photos Agent” and each of the ones starting with “com.apple” click on the row to select it, and then click the X icon in the upper-left.
A confirmation message will appear. Click “Force Quit” to end the process.
Once all of the processes mentioned in step 4 are gone, you can quit Activity Monitor.
Open the Photos app again and, after a few moments, all of your latest photos should start importing from My Photo Stream.

Tags: ios, ipad, iphone, iphoto, os x, photos

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145 Comments Have Been Posted (Leave Your Response)

Vanessa
March 7th, 2017, 6:51 AM

It worked, thank you so much!

Peter Biber
March 10th, 2017, 12:46 PM

Only worked for my iPad; not iPhone. All settings are correct and only SOMETIMES this ‘fix’ works; but mostly not. Any clues??

Rich
April 16th, 2017, 7:48 PM

Worked perfectly on my retina MacBook running Sierra to get my iPhone pics to show up, thanks!

GT
May 13th, 2017, 3:14 AM

THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!! WORKED GREAT

Ellisha
May 19th, 2017, 11:17 PM

VERY HELPFUL! I have had this problem for months, and finally fixed it!!! Thank you!

Alan Riggs
June 7th, 2017, 7:23 AM

Perfect. My new MacBook Pro Photo Stream was stuck, and this worked perfectly. Thank you.

Frank
June 9th, 2017, 4:58 AM

It worked straightaway. I would never have known how to do this without your assistance. Many thanks.

Rosemary Thomas
July 9th, 2017, 4:24 AM

All fixed. Many thanks for making it so simple to follow.

dailytut
July 11th, 2017, 2:16 AM

I dont know why you stopped writing in this blog. YOu have excellent collection of tutorials for mac. Please consider starting to blog again. So many useful problem-solving articles.

Robin.

Rick
September 10th, 2017, 7:20 AM

I used these steps to fix my Photo Stream and it worked to perfection. Thanks!

Jake
September 11th, 2017, 7:03 AM

Worked great. Got all my photos from my phone and iPad on my MacBook Pro again. Thanks so much!

Sam
September 15th, 2017, 3:32 AM

WOW, it really works!!! All the photos in my photo stream appear again!!!!! Thanks!!!!

Meg Huby
September 27th, 2017, 10:59 AM

Superfab advice.
Many many thanks!

christopher putnam
October 3rd, 2017, 9:12 PM

Based on all the positive replies to this fix, I was very hopeful this would solve the problem, but sadly it did not. Very frustrating my iPad Pro and MacBook Pro are no longer sharing photos subsequent to loading Sierra 10.12.6

Shawn
October 6th, 2017, 8:51 AM

Your tip worked great thanks!

Ashish
October 7th, 2017, 5:22 AM

For me, past photos not visible in Mac Photos stream !!

Can we so many on my iPhone

JC
October 12th, 2017, 3:40 PM

perfect thank you!

Barry
October 14th, 2017, 4:10 PM

Thanks so much. Your instructions solved my problem.

Harrie
October 19th, 2017, 3:54 AM

Perfect! Finally my photo stream is syncing again… Thank you !!

Chris
October 23rd, 2017, 7:48 PM

I have been having this issue for about a year now and the solution works each time but it continues to pop up. I have a Macbook Pro running Sierra. Any ongoing solutions that you may have? Really helpful info. Thank you. chris

Brian Allen
October 24th, 2017, 2:32 AM

Worked brilliant, have been beating my head against desk all day trying to find out what to do and this answered it in seconds. Thank you.

ssw
October 27th, 2017, 2:18 PM

It worked!!!Thank you so much – this has been driving me crazy for weeks – just didn’t have time to deal with it.

Deborah
October 29th, 2017, 3:25 AM

This worked! Thank you so much.

Why or how did this work!

Phil
October 31st, 2017, 2:58 AM

UNREAL !!! Problem fixed, back to normal.”Thanks so much for your help”

Marco Gomes
November 18th, 2017, 8:46 PM

Worked here too! Thanks so much.

Anyone knows why this is happening with so many people, and why Apple doesn’t fix it?

stewart
December 30th, 2017, 7:32 AM

Thanks, worked perfectly

Bobby P
December 31st, 2017, 11:59 AM

Thanks for the steps. This issue was perplexing me for a few days, found these well written steps, tried for iPhone and Mac, and it worked in the first try. But for one of my iPads it did not work. After a couple of tries, I found that iPad iOS wasn’t upgraded for sometime. After upgrading, repeated the steps and it worked.

bbarr
January 3rd, 2018, 9:13 AM

Frustrated, my photos stop loading and I have to repeat these steps again and again. This time I can’t quite the processes in the activity monitor. Anyone experienced this? What did you do about it? Thank you.

bbarr
January 3rd, 2018, 9:15 AM

This is a great workaround but I find myself having to repeat these steps all the time. Any advice on how to fix the problem permanently? Thanks.

P54
February 4th, 2018, 10:03 AM

I have the same problem as bbarr. Works one time then not the next and i have to do it again. Really need a permanent solution for my MacBook Pro High Sierra 10.13.3

Cindy
February 18th, 2018, 9:11 AM

Unfortunately this did not work for me …my photos used to share across all of my iOS devices and appear on my mac almost as soon as they were taken. Any other solutions other than to quit the processes?

Cindy
February 18th, 2018, 9:16 AM

KINDLY DISREGARD! I went through the process again and this time it has worked, thank you!

RFH
February 28th, 2018, 8:20 AM

OMG, it worked! I’ve been wasting hours trying to get this resolved. Thank you!

Lorraine
March 5th, 2018, 11:43 AM

Did not work. My photos used to automatically transfer to the iPhoto app. It doesn’t anymore and they don’t appear on the Photo app either. I can’t access all my Christmas pics and the pics we took in our Panama trip. Really disappointed

anne
March 6th, 2018, 10:48 AM

very upsetting, this did not work for me. my photos stopped sharing in the middle of december and i am so frustrated!!! does anyone know another possible way to fix this

Ron
March 16th, 2018, 5:34 PM

It worked on my 27″ iMac. Thanks very much!

Kimberly S Latta
April 21st, 2020, 9:42 AM

I go to photos preferences and Icloud but there is no option for photostream!!!

Joe
August 30th, 2020, 5:25 PM

Didn’t work

Brian
October 18th, 2020, 11:37 PM

Great advice! I found it didn’t work for me so I did everything you suggested PLUS:
1. BEFORE I Force Quit all the “photo”-related activities in Activity Monitor on the Mac, I went to Photos >> Preferences >> iCloud >> [UNcheck] Photo stream
2. In Activity Monitor, I highlighted all “Photo”-related activities (including Photo) and clicked “FORCE QUIT”.
3. On my iPhone I went to Settings >> iCloud – (Account settings where my own image is ) >> Photos >> [UNcheck] Photo stream.
** Be mindful that you’ll lose everything on your iPhone that you took elsewhere in the previous 30 days… but should get it all back in a moment….
4. QUIT Settings; QUIT Photos.
5. Waited a few moments….
6. Opened Settings >> iCloud – (Account settings where my own image is ) >> Photos >> [CHECK] Photo stream
7. On Mac, Open Photos. Then Photos >> Preferences >> iCloud >> [UNCHECK] Photo stream.
All your devices will then automatically sync with images and videos across your iCloud account.

All that done, it all went back to working normally! :-)

Brian
October 18th, 2020, 11:39 PM

** Correction to the previous comment (darn it!)**

Great advice! I found it didn’t work for me so I did everything you suggested PLUS:
1. BEFORE I Force Quit all the “photo”-related activities in Activity Monitor on the Mac, I went to Photos >> Preferences >> iCloud >> [UNcheck] Photo stream
2. In Activity Monitor, I highlighted all “Photo”-related activities (including Photo) and clicked “FORCE QUIT”.
3. On my iPhone I went to Settings >> iCloud – (Account settings where my own image is ) >> Photos >> [UNcheck] Photo stream.
** Be mindful that you’ll lose everything on your iPhone that you took elsewhere in the previous 30 days… but should get it all back in a moment….
4. QUIT Settings; QUIT Photos.
5. Waited a few moments….
6. Opened Settings >> iCloud – (Account settings where my own image is ) >> Photos >> [CHECK] Photo stream
7. On Mac, Open Photos. Then Photos >> Preferences >> iCloud >> [CHECK] Photo stream.
All your devices will then automatically sync with images and videos across your iCloud account.
All that done, it all went back to working normally! :-)

Keypadahpj
January 31st, 2021, 9:58 PM

only a few survived.

Annotationsgyc
February 22nd, 2021, 11:46 AM

book about the chess of love “, created by

Willow
September 28th, 2021, 8:53 AM

Thanks, worked for me! Been having this problem for for a long time. Restarting my Macbook was only solution. Also read somewhere that camera app on iphone has to be off to upload.

wendy
October 10th, 2021, 8:45 PM

AMAZING! worked perfectly! why is this technology so ARCANE for the average user? What you suggested was i imagine way beyond the average user. .anyway, thank you.

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November 7th, 2021, 3:08 PM

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My Photo Stream not updating in Mac Photos app?

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