"Photos" can't be accessed on Mac or onedrive

Attempted to move Mac "Photos" to OneDrive now can't access them. Help please.



MacBook Air 13″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Jul 29, 2024 2:59 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 29, 2024 7:43 AM

What did you try to move, exactly? The Photos app doesn't have pictures in it-- the Photos app is the instructions on what to do with the picture files and their data and organization. The app can't be moved off your Mac.


Do you mean the Photos Library that's located in the Pictures folder? That's where all the pictures are kept, along with the database, thumbnails, previews, and organization information.


The Photos Library must be kept on a local drive, either the Mac's internal drive or an external drive connected by a physical cable. The Photos Library can not work on a Network Drive or on a Cloud source like OneDrive.


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. There have been so many problems with using incompatible drives that the newest macOSs won't even allow a Library on a non-Mac formatted drive to open, since there is a chance of damaging the Photos database. See this:

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


Let us know exactly what you need to do, and we can help. And is it true that you are using macOS 10.15 Catalina from around 2020,, like your signature says?

2 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 29, 2024 7:43 AM in response to sheilafromtoowoomba

What did you try to move, exactly? The Photos app doesn't have pictures in it-- the Photos app is the instructions on what to do with the picture files and their data and organization. The app can't be moved off your Mac.


Do you mean the Photos Library that's located in the Pictures folder? That's where all the pictures are kept, along with the database, thumbnails, previews, and organization information.


The Photos Library must be kept on a local drive, either the Mac's internal drive or an external drive connected by a physical cable. The Photos Library can not work on a Network Drive or on a Cloud source like OneDrive.


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. There have been so many problems with using incompatible drives that the newest macOSs won't even allow a Library on a non-Mac formatted drive to open, since there is a chance of damaging the Photos database. See this:

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


Let us know exactly what you need to do, and we can help. And is it true that you are using macOS 10.15 Catalina from around 2020,, like your signature says?

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"Photos" can't be accessed on Mac or onedrive

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