iPhone photos deleted, now missing from iCloud/Mac

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iPhone photos deleted, now missing from iCloud/Mac

Hi everyone, I need help understanding what happened to my photos.

I had around 36 GB of photos on my iPhone, covering the period from September 2025 to June 2026.

I uploaded them to iCloud Photos, then connected my iPhone to my Mac and imported the photos because I wanted to make sure I had a copy stored on the Mac.

Before the sync finished, my Photos library on the Mac increased to around 280 GB, which made me believe that the iPhone photos had been successfully added to the Mac library.

After the import completed and the Mac finished syncing, I disconnected the iPhone. Since I needed storage space, I deleted those photos from the iPhone because I believed they were already safely stored on both iCloud and my Mac.

Later, I discovered that the photos from that entire period (September 2025 to June 2026) were no longer available.

I also noticed something confusing: after sync completed, the total Photos storage appears to have dropped and now only about 135 GB remains in iCloud instead of the ~280 GB I was seeing on the Mac earlier.

I would like to understand:

Did the import create an independent local copy on the Mac, or was it still linked to iCloud Photos sync?
If photos are deleted from the iPhone while iCloud Photos is enabled, can that deletion remove them from both iCloud and the Mac?
Why did the Mac library appear as ~280 GB during import/sync but later end up showing only ~135 GB?
Is there any way to recover those photos if they are no longer visible?

I already checked the Photos app after noticing the issue.

Any help would be appreciated.

[Edited by Moderator]

Posted on Jun 18, 2026 1:56 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

léonie

Level 10

202,235 points

Jun 18, 2026 4:15 AM in response to ab0kamel

perhaps you misunderstood, how iCloud Photos is working:

As long as both your Mac and your iPhone are syncing with with iCloud Photos, you must not delete any photos from your iPhone that you want to keep in iCloud and on your Mac. Any photo you delete on any of your synced devices will also be deleted fro iCloud and your Mac.

The primary purpose of iCloud Photos is to keep the Photos Libraries on all your devices perfectly in sync and identical . whatever you do on one of your devices (adding adjustments, deleting photos, importing photos) will be sinced to iCloud and from there to your other devices. iCloud Photos is not a separate backup storage, it is the central storage of your Photos Library and you are working with it from any of your devices.

You should plan the size of your iCloud Photos Library so it will fit on your device with the least storage, at least with "optimize Storage" enabled.

To keep the photos save, that do not fit onto your iPhone, save them on your Mac in a separate Photos Library, not in your iCloud Photos Photos Library.You can have several Photos Libraries on your Mac, but only can sync with iCloud Photos. See: Create additional photo libraries in Photos on Mac - Apple Support (EG)

To recover the Photos you just deleted from all your devices, check if you can find some of them in recently Deleted, and put them back, if possible. Check also recently Deleted on your iCloud webpage at www.icloud.com

If you are using Time Machine or another backup method, you may want to check, if Time Machine has made a recent backup, that still includes all your photos.

Restore from Time Machine

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Answer 2

Jun 18, 2026 6:41 AM in response to ab0kamel

Using a cable to transfer pictures and using iCloud Photos are incompatible-- once you turn on iCloud Photos on a Mac, Finder won't let you "synchronize" with a cable. You need to decide which you want to do. Why experience is that iCloud Photos is more robust and reliable. iCloud Photos is different, and we have to adjust our ideas of what we can take advantage of.

It might be useful to you to see this article:

Understanding iCloud Photos - Apple Community

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