How to open iPhoto library on external SSD without importing

Which system version is running on your Mac? If you already upgraded to macOS 13 Ventura, you can no longer open your iPhoto Library directly in Photos, like we could do on the previous system versions. However, we can import photos from an iPhoto Library. You could create a new, empty Photo s Library on your external drive and import the iPhoto Library to this Photos Library on the external to be able to view the photos inside.

Try the following:

• Launch Photos while holding down the options key ⌥ , until the library chooser dialog appears. Then release the options key.
• Now select to create a new library on your external drive.
• When Photos opens on the empty, new library, use the command "File > Import" to import the photos from your iPhoto Library.
• Once the import has finished, you can browse the photos in Photos.

Alternately, if you own PowerPhotos, update it to PowerPhotos 2.3. Then you can use it to create Photos Libraries from your iPhoto Libraries. The new version will also save the albums and folders.

We have often seen ExFAT to be the source of problems for Photos. And I'm afraid the more you mess with it, the more likely it is that damage may be done to the library. If you re-format this hard drive, then it will erase everything on it! So you need to transfer it, even if temporarily, to a compatibly formatted drive. If you have room on your internal drive you can use that. Just drag it over.

If you don't have room on your internal drive, you need another drive you can format. You can use the app Disk Utility to format a disk drive. You have an M1 Air, so APFS is the best choice.

There are ways to partition a drive and have more than one format but, honestly, I wouldn't try it without already having a backup of the Library.

PPPPMMMM wrote:

WMy external drive is not formatted to APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format. It is formatted to ExFAT. So there is no way other than to format the external drive to be able to load it?

That's your problem. Photos libraries MUST be located on a drive that's formatted either APFS or OS X Extended (journaled). It won't work on any other formatted drive. Copy it to a correctly formatted volume and try opening it. With luck it will open and run.

If you need to have the drive formatted ExFAT for use with a PC you'll need another drive properly formatted for the library.

It is perfectly normal to operate a Photos Library on a properly formatted external drive. What do you mean that "importing" is " exactly what it does when I try to open it on my MacBook?" What exactly is happening that causes you to think it is being "imported?" What messages are you seeing, and what is the behavior of Photos?

How is this external drive formatted? That could be causing some problems. You can find out by selecting the drive's icon and using ⌘-i to open the Info window.

This shows my drive is formatted as APFS. To get full functionality (and to avoid damaging the Photos Library) an external drive must be formatted in either APFS format or Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format. Additionally, the drive can not have had Time Machine on it since it was formatted. The drive must not be a network drive-- it should be connected directly to the computer using a cable.

Fat Cat Software's PowerPhotos has just released a new version that can open and convert in Ventura an iPhoto library to a Photos library and preserve the organization, i.e. folders and albums, and metadata. With it you can convert it directly to a Photos library.

Apple has described here, how you need to prepare an external drive to use with Photos:

Move your Photos library to save space on your Mac - Apple Support

Good luck for moving your library to a safe place.

Now I am confused. In your original post you wrote "I have an external drive which has an iPhoto library (400GB) on it." So I assumed you need to migrate an iPhoto Library. But now you write "along with it showing the photos app emblem as the icon".

What are you seeing on your external drive?

• An iPhoto Library?
• A Photos Library?
• The Photos.app?

It is only a a library, if the icon is showing a stack of three pictures.

And we need to know if your system version is the most recent version, macOS 13 Ventura or not, as the handling of iPhoto Libraries has changed with macOS 13.