Deleted photos not really deleted

Thanks for your reply. They are not in a separated album or in Recently Deleted (it's empty). When I search in Photos the deleted photo file name (e.g. IMG_0015.JPG) I get no results. It's not there. But it is in Masters folder.

A very clear example of this behavior is when I shoot a HDR photo with my iPhone. I have turned on the option of keeping both versions in Settings, this way I can compare both and keep the best, the other gets fully deleted. I found every pair of versions in Masters folder.

Another example: when I share some photos or screenshots via Twitter and edit / crop them before sending, Twitter makes a copy of the edited photo in Photos.app. I always delete those, but I still have them in Masters folder.

I have done some tests and It only happens with photos, not videos. When I shoot photos in the street for example (not connected to a Wi-Fi network) and delete a bunch of them (in Recently Deleted too), I return home and the iPhone uploads every single photo via Wi-Fi.

It would be interesting and helpful if someone with iCloud Photo Library can test this behavior.

Ok, I've done some extra testing and I have found that's an iOS 8.x / iOS 9.x bug. I was wrong before, it also happens with videos: I don't have any video in my iCloud Photo Library but I have several in Masters folder.

Steps to reproduce on iPhone / iPad (same with videos):

1. Turn off Wi-Fi.
2. Shoot two photos.
3. Delete the first one and leave it at Recently Deleted album.
4. Delete the second photo and delete it from Recently Deleted album too.
5. Go to Settings > Photos and Camera. You will see it says something like "Required Wi-Fi, 2 photos pending upload". Notice that it says two, instead of one.
6. Connect to a Wi-Fi network and let iCloud Photo Library update.
7. Go to your Mac, open Photos and you will see only one photo in Recently Delete album (the first one). Delete it permanently.
8. Go to Finder, find your iCloud Photo Library > Show package content > Masters > 2015 > 10 > (day folder) > 201510(day)-(time). You will see the second photo, supposedly deleted permanently from iCloud. But it wasn't, because the iPhone uploaded it anyways.

When you do the same but connected to a Wi-Fi network, it works fine: when you delete photos from Recently Deleted album, they are deleted from iCloud and from the Masters folder.

I don't know why, but when you delete photos or videos from Recently Deleted and iCloud Photo Library is not up to date (because you are not connected to a Wi-Fi network, for example) the iPhone keeps them in his memory and then uploads them "invisibly" to iCloud. So the workaround is shoot photos / videos, delete those you don't want to keep, but not delete them from Recently Deleted iOS album until all of them are uploaded to iCloud.

And I don't know if these "deleted" items are wasting iCloud storage. I don't see an easy way to delete them permanently, because they don't show up anywhere besides Masters folder. Maybe removing directly from there?

I'm going to submit this bug to Apple; I will keep this thread updated.

Hi Phil,

Issue is still happening in iOS 9.1. Some weeks ago I submitted this problem here: http://www.apple.com/feedback/

I wrote this:

Hello,

In an iOS device with iCloud Photo Library enabled and not connected to a Wi-Fi network, deleting photos that are not yet in iCloud from library and from Recently Deleted album it's not working because they are being uploaded to iCloud Photo Library after connecting to Wi-Fi.

Steps on iOS:

1. Disconnect from Wi-Fi.

2. Shoot one photo and delete it, from Recently Deleted album too.

3. Connect to a Wi-Fi network and let iCloud Photo Library update.

4. Open Photos for OS X and let it update. Deleted photo doesn't show up anywhere (that's OK).

5. Show Package Contents of iCloud Photo Library and that "fully deleted" photo is in Masters folder (iOS uploaded it to iCloud).

When you do the same but connected to Wi-Fi from start, it's deleted everywhere.

Thank you.

Maybe if more people report this to Apple they will take a look.

Have you tried to delete those photos from Masters folder to get your iCloud storage space back? I don't really think that will work, but I don't see another way to delete them from Apple servers.

I eventually will start a brand new iCloud Photo Library and, until it is confirmed as resolved, always be careful not to delete photos from Recently Deleted unless I'm connected to Wi-Fi and photos already uploaded. But, of course, that's a huge pain if you have lots of photos 😟