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"Preparing to import" from iPhone to Photos on Catalina

I upgraded to Catalina and ran into trouble when I tried to import my photos FROM my iPhone 7 to my Mac. I already had my phone connected so I could sync things through the new Finder window (which worked fine). When I opened Photos to sync pictures as well and clicked on my iPhone in the Devices list, it immediately showed a message that said "Preparing to import from..." and then just sat there with no indication anything was happening. After several searches for help, I finally figured out something that worked.


I closed Photos on my Mac, "ejected" my iPhone via the Finder window and disconnected it physically, reopened Photos (without my phone connected yet), woke my phone up/turned it on and physically connected it. The Photos devices list recognized my iPhone and blinked through a message about granting permission, then popped up with the photos from my phone to allow me to sync/download them. Hopefully this will help someone else if they have the same problem.

iPhone 7

Posted on Mar 13, 2020 8:53 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Mar 14, 2020 10:26 AM

Thanks for the feedback. You should mark your post as solved so others with the same problem will be alerted to the solution in your topic.


Similar questions

3 replies

Apr 12, 2020 8:33 PM in response to SCCdg

That didn't work for me. I just updated to Catalina yesterday, thinking it'd probably be safe to do so by now, and whooops. This photos app is just messed up.


I did what was suggested above. Then it hung for awhile on asking me to unlock the phone, which was unlocked. Then I tried importing one picture, and it never finished. I clicked the "Stop Import" button, and it doesn't do anything. I think I'll have to use Image Capture until this is fixed.

"Preparing to import" from iPhone to Photos on Catalina

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