Mac Os Catalina do not sync photos with iOS Devices

Im using Mac OS Catalina 10.15, I have my photos on the Photos App, (I do not use iCloud photos).


To sync the photos, I connect the iPad to the Mac, open Finder (Since iTunes is gone), select the iPad from (locations) go to the right and click on Photos, select the albums and then hit sync. All the photos are not synced and apparently it syncs the albums under the root "My Albums" but is not able to sync the albums that are inside a folder.





Mac Pro

Posted on Oct 8, 2019 3:04 PM

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Posted on Nov 3, 2019 11:27 PM

Wow. Brilliant. It won't help everyone, but this helped me. I only wanted two folders of photos on my iPhone, the one of our cats and another album of selected photos. So, by moving those albums to sit under 'My Albums' instead of being sub-folders, I was finally able to get the photos I wanted on my iPhone.


Maybe this trick will help some others as well: if you can live with just a few albums on your phone, move them under 'My Albums' and then synch your iPhone through Finder.


Thanks Diego!!!

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1,232 replies

Mar 26, 2020 12:51 PM in response to dervatii

First attempt to sync my photos folders and albums to phone failed. Rebooted phone and iMac. Went through sync again and it was a lengthy process - iTunes was never this slow. I then looked on my phone and there was an Album - however it had 3 photos instead of 95. After a few moments I noticed it had 5 photos and found it said syncing at the bottom of the album and was adding either 1 or a small bunch of photos every few seconds. In the time I have written this it has synced about 80. Quite bizarre but my phone is also no longer connected to Finder - what is going on????

Mar 26, 2020 12:58 PM in response to pjstingray

Sadly I have given up hope and moved to another photography platform.


  • Apple has forgotten us
  • They have put out the worst OS since the introduction of OSx
  • Catalina is an unmitigated disaster in every sense of the word
    • I have moved back to OS 10.14.6 but sadly since the Photos app had been updated for Catalina, there is no going backwards, which is why I have abandoned Photos and moved along
  • I should not have to figure out the technology, it should work the way we work
  • iPhone & iPad is still awesome, but Apple has neglected and forgotten about the very users (like me) who helped make them the creative force they used to be. My entire agency runs on Apple and we are all back on 10.14.6 so the machines will actually run and we can actually make a living


Sad to see what is happening.



Mar 26, 2020 10:52 PM in response to prlblue

@prlblue: Re. Good idea with the time mashine backup: However did you know that if you backup your contacts in the cloud they are NOT backed up on time mashine? I lost 80% of my 400+ contacts last week in the cloud and searched them on my daily time mashine backup. Apple confirmed that they are safed either in the cloud OR on time mashine. (...and they had not been in the last iCloud.com backups)

In addition to the sync mistake of my 23.000+ photos since more than a year I worked now for three days getting back info of the lost contacts.


As most of you confirmed here: Apple has lost his premium approach since quiet a while. Time to say goodbye.

Mar 26, 2020 11:34 PM in response to FetaLovingGreekGuy

I agree that Apple have let us all down. I have $5000 cash in the bank that I have stopped myself spending with Apple to buy a new Mac because the relationship is coming to an end. Not because there have been problems but because Apple has failed to address them or seemingly care. I have been an Apple user for decades, bought the first iPod and iPhones and built all my digital life on Mac.

Can those leaving with me suggest the best alternative to Photos and another platform...

Mar 27, 2020 8:49 AM in response to crisu

Just updated and put my albums back in the events folder and they all synced apart from one folder that had modified photos in, for some reason photos doesn’t recognise modified photos anymore! When I resynced it’s duplicated some folders by copying certain pictures again so one album has 10 pictures but on my phone I have 20! Can not believe Apple can’t fix something so simple!

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Mac Os Catalina do not sync photos with iOS Devices

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