I would not recommend to repair the Photos Library, unless we have tracked down our Photos Library as the likely culprit, when Photos is acting up.
I listed my reasons for this here in this new user Tip:
When should we repair a Photos Library? - Apple Community
Comments are welcome 😊
MacBook Pro 15”, macOS 10.15
When I am sure, that all my photos and videos are in iCloud, and I think the library needs repairing, I prefer to download the library from iCloud to a new, empty library instead of repairing it.
That will save the lengthy upload and merging into the iCloud Library, and the library will be rebuilt, perfectly in sync with iCloud. The project will be gone, however, but I have not created any projects anyway, since Apple stopped the print services.
It is nice to see you back in the Photos forum, Rysz.
When I am sure, that all my photos and videos are in iCloud, and I think the library needs repairing, I prefer to download the library from iCloud to a new, empty library instead of repairing it.
That will save the lengthy upload and merging into the iCloud Library, and the library will be rebuilt, perfectly in sync with iCloud. The project will be gone, however, but I have not created any projects anyway, since Apple stopped the print services.
It is nice to see you back in the Photos forum, Rysz.
My biggest concern is that the repair may be making the damage worse, if there is a problem that cannot be repaired, for example, if the drive is failing or the format of the file system is wrong or the library has been damaged by third party cleaning software or moving it into a dropbox or similar.
After a repair we should look for recovered items. A repair might turn up orphaned files or lost albums. I found recently many edited versions created by external editors, that suddenly appeared as new photos. Older Live Photos suddenly appeared as a pair of a video and still frame.
Sometimes manually added faces disappeared.
To find new user tips you could use the "my Subscriptions" view in the ASC forums. Use the filter at the left side of the My Subscriptions page the filter for user tips and the forums you want.
For example, for me, the My Subscriptions is looking like this, when I filter for user tips.
The filter will produce a URL like this: https://discussions.apple.com/profile/léonie/subscriptions?page=1&activity=filterFollowing&type=filterUserTips
Sometimes you will also find new User Tips on the entry page to the Apple Support Communities.
Your tests confirm - repairing is not a routine operation, to be taken lightly, and never without having a working backup. And rebuilding by downloading from iCloud will only help, if the problem has not been propagated to iCloud.
It would help, if Apple would clearly describe, what kind of problems can be fixed by "repairing". The Photos user guide is rather vague on this: Repair your library in Photos on Mac - Apple Support
"If you experience problems with photos in a library, you can try to repair it."
What kind of problems can be fixed?
For the record...
I rebuild a copy of my 19K Photos Library. After a quick review...
Results:
Conclusion:
Your mileage (with Rebuilding) may vary...
Try this theme sorted list of user tips: Thematic Index to Photos for Mac related User Tips - Apple Community
More recent User Tips for Photos in Catalina - frequently asked questions
Aside from the time repairing takes, are there any common pitfalls that occur? Lost metadata? Lost links between thumbnails and full size images? Lost face names? Anything else to look at and check after the repair?
I'm experiencing so many different issues with Photos (and on multiple devices) that I may not have an option. Based on what you’re saying, I’ll just try rebuilding a copy of the library, with iCloud turned off, to first see what happens.
Thank you.
Good point, perhaps I’ll try this method first. Have to digest the options some more.
My main concern is that I’m experiencing problems (although it’s difficult to say if they’re always identical) on my laptop and iPad, not just the Mac, so the issues might be propagating over iCloud Photos.
[ Yeah, I’m back as a “consumer” but since I’m here... ]
Good tips. Is there an FAQ or location to find these again ?
I tried searching for " User Tips for Photo" , and Photos FAQ etc
But those searches bring up a lot of often very old entries.
Do not repair the Photos Library unless you are sure, the library is damaged
