Photos not importing correct 'date taken'

I know I am replying to a very old post but after a year of having Mac I have the same problem. I import old images from Windows or from an iPhone attachment and the date created is actually the date at which it is imported into the Mac not the date on which it was taken. This means that I can't sort a series of images by the date on which they were shot. Like many people I find Apple Photos (and its weird relationship to Finder) deeply frustrating and impractical compared to MS Windows Explorer. In fact I'm going to buy a cheap PC on which to load and keep my photos and give up with the Apple Photos app. Which seems a shame as it defeats the point of buying a Mac in the first place.

How are you importing them, from what are you importing them, and how are you viewing the dates?

Example 1: Do you import them directly into the Photos app from the camera's memory card and view their dates there?

Example 2: Do you import them by copying from a Windows disk to your Mac disk and view their dates in Finder?

There are many other possibilities.

Not directly related to your "date" issue but you did say "As I don't have any other Apple gadgets I am not interested in having photos saved in the iCloud - I just want everything on my MBP.". You will lose your photos if you do not back them up onto the cloud, an external drive, a network drive etc. Computer hard drives fail and yours will fail at some point. So a word of advice, back up your photos if you value them or you will lose them.

Apple_Glen_UK wrote:

All my photos are on an external hard drive. I've looked online and others seem to have the sane problem but I haven't yet found a solution.

OK, that answers one of my questions: you are importing from an external hard drive. Since you came from another OS, I'm guessing that it is in some Windows format (FAT, FAT32, NTFS, etc.).

Let's skip to my third question: How are you viewing the dates?

If you are using the Finder to view them, Finder only looks at the file creation/modification dates, which are attributes of the file containing the photo. The date the photo was taken is contained within the data portion of the file. You'll need to use something more specialized to photos than Finder. Some applications, like Apple's new Photos application, will want to import the photos into their own databases before they will display the dates they were taken. Others allow viewing the internal metadata without importing the photos.

Back to my first question: How are you importing the photos?

Implied in that question: Into what are you importing them?

Try posting here:

Photos for Mac

That's most mysterious and contrary to my experiences.

There are (at least) two places in the Photos application where the date taken ought to be visible and correct:

1. In the Photos tab (if not viewing the sidebar) or the Photos entry at the top of the sidebar (Years, Collections, Moments).

2. In the Info window (displayed by selecting one or more photos and selecting Window > Info (or command-I).

For me, they both show the data taken.

For you, they show the date imported??

In the Finder, file creation and modification dates appear in the Info window or in the list format of a regular Finder window.

For me, they usually show the date the file was created (which may be days after the photo was taken).

For you, they show the date the photo was taken (even if it was uploaded days later)??

I believe that some Windows tools (and a few Mac tools) dummy up a file creation date from the photo's internal metadata (date taken). That could explain the Finder results you are seeing.

The results you report in Photos make it sound like something forced the internal metadata to match the actual file creation date, essentially swapping the two sets of dates. I don't know why that would happen.

Have you tried taking new pictures and copying them straight from the camera to the Mac without passing through the PC? If so, do they behave the same way as the ones that have been processed by your PC programs?