Photos app stuck on "Restoring" Screen after Catalina Update

Don't have any solution, but I experienced the exact same thing you did with a similar sized Photos library. I have been using Apple's discontinued Aperture software and recently switched to Photos. Photos has a lot of short comings, but since it was free I thought I would give it a try. Now that Photos is inoperable with the Catalina update, I am done with it and I am in the process switching to Capture One.

I have been having same issues with photos. I've been attempting to migrate from older iMac to a new iMac. I am frustrated beyond words. Apple Support has been no help at all. They have no good answers. They just keep shoving me off to another 'Senior Advisor' or someone from the Creative Media section. Never get the call backs they promise ( waiting for one as we speak that was supposed to happen 45 minutes ago). They apparently are clueless as to how to fix this problem even though it appears to be a wide spread problem.

I am in the process of trying to export my raw images from my old iMac. Once that process completes (hopefully) I will then attempt to copy to external hard drive and import raw images into Photos on new iMac. I will need to get Photos to launch which I think I will be able to do by creating a new empty Photos Library.

All in all a dismal effort on Apples part.

My library is on an external drive that I just purchased a few weeks ago, and formatted to APFS.

As you are getting permission errors - have you tried to set the "Ignore ownership on this volume" flag?

Select your drive in the Finder, open the info with ⌘I, then click the padlock at the bottom if the Info , enter the password, and click the "Ignore Ownership" checkmark.

The external volume must not be used for Time Machine backups ar have any other backup software installed.

I have the same issue after updating to Catalina. When I start Photos, the screen with repairing library appears and remains at 0% forever. Also, when I look into the contents of the library folder, it doesn't look like any files are changed, and the software doesn't use much CPU. I am really not sure whether it does anything at all.

I'm afraid I have exactly the same issue.

After updating to Calatina, photos had to "upgrade" itself. But now I opened it again it and doesn't go away from "Restoring 0%... complete".

Consistent to what other users say and no CPU activity either.

Same problem after updating to Cataline, photos started "updating photos" process takes hours then everything is fine I can see my photos but next day photos app doesn't work with "Restoring" %0 Complete" on the scereen.. waiting couple of hours nothing changed, and closed the app many times every time same thing "nothing" So i can easyly say "Cataline sucks", the very core of apple which is working smootly does not excist any more

I have the same issue - very frustrating - hopefully apple will relase a fix to this soon as the app is completely unsuable. I have a photos library stored on external hard drive with icloud photos on.

I do not have a reassuring answer for you. I 'updated' Photos library after installing Catalina, which took at least a night. My photo library is on an external disk. Even after Photos was done and I could see the photos again, and after quitting Photos, the finder would not let me eject the external USB HD, because it was still using it. I could also see that in Monitor. I forced quit.

Now however, it stuck 0% restoring... when I open the library...

The same thing happened to me after I upgraded to Catalina on my MacBook Pro (mid-2012). I ended up deleting the photoslibrary package and reinstalling all 123gb of photos from various back ups over a number of days. Everything was fine until I installed the latest Catalina update yesterday. I checked and photos worked fine after so switched the computer off. I’ve switched on this morning and it’s gone back to the 0% restoring screen. Incredibly frustrating. I’m going to leave it running for the day to see if anything progresses. One of the things I noticed before is that the photoslibrary package continued to show only as 101mb despite all the photos being installed. The photos folder showed 123gb though so I don’t know if that’s significant. It’s good to know it’s not just me struggling with this but no one seems to have a solution.

I had the same hope but the problem continues. After the last update I checked Photos was working, it was and opened immediately. I switched the computer off but the following morning when I switched it on it was back to the restoring screen. It took 10 hours to work through it, then worked fine. Again after switching the computer off Photos then when back to restoring taking another 10 hours. So it works fine as long as the computer is on, but closing down somehow causes a problem. I logged an issue with Apple yesterday and will do so again today.

My impression is that it is a problem with the face recognition. Last time photos managed to start up (after some 10 hours), it had about half the photos scanned for faces, this time (again after some 10 hours), it has only scanned some 5'000 out of 40'000 pictures. I actually don't need that feature, but it seems it can't be switched off? Apple is really annoying me more and more by imposing unnecessary stuff. I've been using Macs for 20 years now, but if they continue like that, my next computer won't be a Mac.

I was wondering the same thing about the face scanning. I’ve left the computer on for 24 hours and it’s worked it’s way through about 26,000 of the 38,000 photos. I’m hoping after it’s worked through them all that may sort the problem. Like you I’m frustrated with not being able to turn the face scanning off. This is the first major issue I’ve had with Apple in 20 years of owning their computers and it’s been incredibly time consuming, confusing and draining.