after I updated to iOS18 my photos in iMessages with contacts have disappeared. I have restarted my phone but all the photos have gone. And also when searching for messages it is bugging out and showing (my messages that I sent) that someone else had said it.
iPhone 15 Pro Max, iOS 18
Here’s the fix:
Go to Settings>Apps>Messages
Click on Siri and turn all those settings off and then back on again.
Then go back to the previous menu and click on Search. Turn all those settings off and back on again also.
Now when you go back to your photos in your messages, you will see a message saying the phone is indexing all your messages. Give it some time. It might take a few hours or even a whole day, but all your photos in your messages should come back eventually.
Didn’t work for me.
I tried the above settings suggestion and that didn’t work. Ultimately I figured out that my iCloud email address was not connected to iMessage on my new phone (settings > apps> messages > send & receive > select both phone # and email). After that, when I go into the “info” section of an iMessage thread and scroll all the way down, there is an option to “download” from iCloud. After downloading those photos, I now have access to all of the interim photos that had been missing from when I switched phones / upgraded to iOS 18.
the issue I'm having is that on my Macs running Sequoia, the contact photos for some of my contacts is missing. Some are Pinned convos, some are not -- I tried multiple things, including disabling SIRI and search settings and re-enabled them, as well as resyncing messages. Nothing brings them back. I haven't tried updating the Contact photo, because I don't have some of those pictures anymore and I'd like to preserve the ones I had.
X
Perfect fix! I was going crazy trying to find old photos by flipping back through the text stream!! THANK YOU!!!
how long did it take?
i did this ima give it time to work (will be coming back with a update if it worked or not)
Thank you, it is working. Followed the exact steps and it’s now restoring message photos and links.
See ive done that, but only links have shown up, none of my older photos, its only been links and collaborations
I did this but only messages, Links, and RECENT photos show up.
Im trying to get older photos from around 2022-2023 that should have been backed up. But those photos wont appear still
After iOS 18 update photos in iMessage have disappeared
