iPhone Wallpaper Shuffle limits available people selection

I have tried multiple times to setup a wallpaper option that shuffles photos between my 2 children, but only 1 child is available when I go to select people. Teh only options are one child, my spouse and 3 other (seemingly random) people. Why aren't the same people available in Photos available in the Wallpaper shuffle setup? Anyone have a solution to this problem?

iPhone 13 mini

Posted on Aug 17, 2023 4:36 PM

Reply
Question marked as Apple recommended

Please check your People Album to see the faces that are tagged and named. The pic below is self-explanatory



Posted on Aug 18, 2023 5:42 AM

27 replies

Oct 25, 2023 12:48 PM in response to NMWSeattle

I had this issue both on iOS 16/17. On top of that, the people I could chose only had old pictures available.

The fix for me was:

  1. Note the people that are currently available in the Wallpaper/Photo Shuffle
  2. Removing these people from the "People Album" in the photo app
  3. This forced a refresh of Photo Shuffle, within seconds the missing people & images were there.
  4. Add back the removed people to the "People Album".


Nov 3, 2023 11:26 AM in response to Charles Meyerson

Just wanted to add a little to the steps I mentioned above as I have found some people still experienced issued where the problem came back moments after.


What seems to be the complete fix/solution is:

  1. Removing ALL people from the "People Album" in the photo app
  2. Let the photos app analyse, rebuild and find the people. That seems to be what actually flushes the problem.
  3. Add back the removed people to the "People Album".
  4. The Photo shuffle should see everyone now.


Nov 4, 2023 2:47 AM in response to Abstulo

This kinda worked for me. After deleting people on my albums and having the phone reset and do its thing, i was able to see all my people on the shuffle list, but just for 1 time. After setting it, I forgot to pick 1 person so I went back to wallpapers to change it, and I am back to the same problem I had before - only 6 of my 30+ people are showing.

Nov 8, 2023 2:11 AM in response to NMWSeattle

I’ve had this problem ever since the option had been available. Bad show by apple that it still exists today after a couple of years. I’ve tried what Abstulo suggested and that has allowed the three people I wanted to show while setting up photo shuffle on my lock screen. Soon as I add the one and only person out of four back into my people album. The other three vanish from the lock screen photo shuffle.


So I’ve gone back to my people album and removed them all. After doing so it showed one more person in the people album. But with no photo or name. So I’ve selected it and removed.


I then had a prompt saying if I removed this blank person. It would reset all the people. “Wish I’d taken a screen shot”


I’ll update once I get to have the phone on charge and locked so the phone can update the people album. Hopefully this will force it back into working.


Nov 27, 2023 9:30 PM in response to Mlewis321

Same issue and also with my kids, which is especially funny for me because two of my kids are identical twins and the app has a lot of trouble distinguishing them. I ended up telling photos that they are the same person, which seems to have made them disappear entirely from my wallpaper options.


But I’m guessing most people are talking about this for their kids because it’s the most obvious and fulfilling used case. It was actually working for me for a couple months, though it seemed to not show all of the kids evenly, but I can’t be sure if that’s just because some get more photos taken of them than others. 🤣🤣


Anyway, I am merely awaiting a fix for this and will have to go back to a boring old wallpaper until then.

Nov 28, 2023 1:10 PM in response to NMWSeattle

After several years and no real fix by Apple, with some limited fixes posted here -- does anyone know if Apple truly gets this information and ever replies with an update on fixes to bugs? it is such a great feature and doubt it works for the Apple programmers themselves so why won't they provide fix? I can only see some of my "people" and even then it only cycles through about the same 8 photos. So frustrating.

iPhone Wallpaper Shuffle limits available people selection

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