I'm on a Mac mini M4 Pro running macOS 15.3.1 and the title says it all. I've rebuilt the photos library and waited while it was indexed, and if I search for "flower" the library correctly identifies photos of flowers but selecting one does get the Visual Look Up sparkly info icon. All the same photos *do* get the Visual Look Up icon on both my iPhone and iPad. Is there a setting somewhere that I'm missing?
Thanks in advance.
Mac mini, macOS 15.3
The manual page does no longer mention any settings: Use Visual Look Up to learn more about a photo on Mac - Apple Support (TM)
There used to be a setting in "Siri&Search" and earlier in "Spotlight", but these System Settings are gone in macOS 15.3. Currently there is a new Setting directly in Photos: in Photos > Settings > General : Search: Enhanced Visual Search
I wish, Apple would document the necessary settings in the user guide page for "Visual Look-up" and stop moving them around with new system versions.
Visual Lookup is working for me on my Mac - I have enabled all Settings for Apple Intelligence. And the enhanced Visual Search in Photos.
Selecting alone does not suffice. You would have to click it to open it enlarged. Then the Info button in the toolbar should show the stars and turn blue when you click it and the badge with the leave should appear in the center of the flower picture.
And did you restart the Mac after enabling "Search: Enhanced Visual Search"? The Mac may need some time to scan your library.
I am running out of ideas, where our settings might be different. I hope someone will jump in.
I have also enabled "Photos" in the system Settings > Spotlight, but to should not matter.
Butting in, here: I have a PowerBook M3 pro with 15.3.1, and visual lookup doesn't work for me, either. Since I see it all the time on my phone and iPad, I hadn't really noticed on my Mac. And I have a habit of looking stuff up with Google Images.
I'm pretty sure visual lookup worked at some point, but I may be remembering Sonoma. I've certainly re-started several times since Sequoia, and I've also used Safe-mode. I'm pretty sure I've re-built a Library, but maybe not my System Library. I'll take some time to try a few things out, but it seems like I've done everything I can think of.
I've restarted several times, and also rebuilt the Photos Library and waited quite some time while it was reindexed. During that time if I tried to search for "Flower" I'd get a message that library was being indexed. Once that was finished, I could again search for "Flower" and Photos would find all my photos containing flowers ... but doesn't do the "Enhanced" part of actually identifying what they are (and showing this with the sparkly info icon).
However, I have found a difference in our settings! I don't see "Photos" in Spotlight search.
I'm glad you dropped in, Richard.
It is good to know, that Erroll is not alone with the problem. Australian English should be supported.
Time to submit a bug report.
Well, Texas English certainly is supported, in everything else, anyway. I'll take some time to try all the usual remedies, and I'll get back...
Thanks for the reply. None of what you describe happens when I open a photo that has been identified as a flower. The info button remains standard with no sparkles and, when opened, the info pane contains no information about the photo's subject.
All of this works as advertised on my iPhone and iPad for the same photos.
Thanks again for the reply. Photos > Settings > General : Search: Enhanced Visual Search is enabled.
System Settings > Apple Intelligence & Siri > Apple Intelligence is enabled. Extensions > Chat GPT is enabled and Daily Limit shows "Under Limit".
Still no sparkly "i" icon; still no Look Up in the info pane.
Also, are you using iCloud Photos? I am, but just disabled and restarted and it made no difference: still no "Photos" in Spotlight Search Categories, and still no sparkly info icon in Photos.
Thanks for your efforts.
The system language on my Mac is currently set to German, so I remembered incorrectly the name of the Spotlight setting. I meant "Images" when I wrote Photos. Your Settings are the same as mine.
Yes, I am also using iCloud Photos.
Which country are you in?
There's an error in the above. It should read "... correctly identifies photos of flowers but selecting one doesn't get the Visual Look Up sparkly info icon." Sorry for the confusion.
I'm in Australia (and the break in communication was me sleeping).
I changed my system language to US English, rebooted and waited while my Photos library was indexed yet again. It made no difference.
Visual Look Up Not Working on Mac
