iPhone photos appear on iMac as well, without me importing them.

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Level 1

31 points

iPhone photos appear on iMac as well, without me importing them.

Hello,

I may be missing something obvious here, but I wonder if anyone can help me out.

When I take a photo with my iPhone (XS Max), it appears on the phone as I expect, but it also appears in the Photos app on my iMac without me importing it.

How is this happening? I am NOT using iCloud Photos.

I'm not complaining about this as I find it a very useful feature, but I just want to understand HOW it is happening.

See screenshots below. I did a search for a given photo that appears in Photos on my iMac in Finder, and there is is: IMG_8936.JPG in the Photos Library. How did it get there?

Any help and advice welcome. :)

Thanks

Keith

iMac 27" 5K, 10.14

Posted on Feb 7, 2019 6:19 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

léonie

Level 10

200,621 points

Feb 7, 2019 6:33 AM in response to dradd

My Photo Stream is enabled. If it is enabled on the iPhone as well, any new features you are taking on the iPhone will appear on your Mac and vice versa.

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Answer 2

léonie

Level 10

200,621 points

Feb 7, 2019 11:27 AM in response to dradd

If you are seeing the photos on you Mac in the Photos view and not only in the My Photo Steam album, they have been imported to your Mac and you can delete them from My Photo Stream on the iPhone. But My Photo Stream will be emptied automatically after 30 days are up or the limit of ^1000 photos has been reached. I would not bother with doing it manually.

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Answer 3

Old Toad

Level 10

215,646 points

Feb 7, 2019 11:18 AM in response to dradd

Yes, the photo will remain in the Photos library on your Mac but will be removed from the Photo Stream on both devices.

There's no advantage to be gained storage wise on either of your devices for deleting photos from the My Photo Stream if that's what you're getting at.

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Answer 4

tynegal

Level 3

547 points

Feb 8, 2019 10:03 AM in response to dradd

Anotehr point: once photos have been synced via Photo Stream they are stored in the Photos library. on your Mac. If you want to permanently delete them, as with photos in folders, you need to remove them from the master library.

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Answer 5

dradd Author

Level 1

31 points

Feb 7, 2019 6:39 AM in response to léonie

Thanks. So I assume deleting photos from My Photo Stream on my iPhone will NOT delete the same photo from the iMac Photos library, ONLY the Photo Stream? So the file itself stays in the iMac Photos Library on the hard drive but vanishes from the Photo Stream?

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iPhone photos appear on iMac as well, without me importing them.

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