Stuck On "Preparing to Import Photos" When Manually Connecting iPhone to MacBook

Not a question so much as a resolution that has worked but SHOULD NOT be the resolve.

1) First reboot both the Mac and your iPhone

2) When both are back up and logged in, connect your photo to your Mac

3) Go to your Photos app on your Mac. Make sure you have "Open photos on this device" check marked. It will probably still read "Preparing to Import ..."

4) Now, with your phone still connected, enter your quick setting and turn on "Airplane Mode"

5) Wait a few seconds - 5 to 8 on average. You should see the phone icon briefly disappear from the side menu as if it was unplugged and then re-appear about a second or two later as if it was plugged back in

6) A second of two later your iPhone photo library should begin populating in the Mac Photos app.

If this does work, there's a procedure to try that involves booting the machine into Safe Mode.

Be that as it may, this is clearly a bug and I hope Apple fixes it pronto because I've seen complaints dating as far back as April 2022. Manually connecting my phone to my Mac should not induce a new unknown step.