So confused: Photos vs All Photos

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Level 1

29 points

So confused: Photos vs All Photos

Howdy all -

OK, after years of just importing photos to iPhone/now Photos and forgetting about them, I'm trying to get better at navigating the program.

I am so confused. My latest is what in the world is the difference between the "All Photos" album and the "Photos" icon at the top of the side bar.

Posted on Nov 3, 2015 1:47 PM

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Answer 1

léonie

Level 10

200,789 points

Nov 3, 2015 5:50 PM in response to Atlantax

Photos and All Photos are two differnt ways to access the library.

"All Photos" is a smart album, showing you all your photos, even the photos you have hidden. It is sorted by the date you import the photos, so the most recently imported photos will always be at the bottom of the list.
"Photos" is the library view. It is sorted by the capture date and split into moments. The moments are created automatically based on the capture date and the location. Photos taken at the same time at the same place appear in one moment. Related moments will be grouped into collections. And collections into years. Clicking the places names in the Photos view will show the photos on a map. To switch between moments, collections, years in the Photos view use the < > keys to the right of the traffic light buttons.
See this help page: https://help.apple.com/photos/mac/1.0/?lang=en#/pht56eafa987

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Answer 2

léonie

Level 10

200,789 points

Nov 4, 2015 12:00 AM in response to Atlantax

They should be in "All Photo"s as well, but it is hard to predict, where they will appear, because the import session date will be the original import session date.

If the photos do not appear in All Photos at all, repair your Photos library.

But that will cause an upload of all photos to iCloud again and may take days for a large library. The photos will not actually upload again, but need to be compared to iCloud, one by one.

Make a current backup, before you try that:

See this Help page: https://help.apple.com/photos/mac/1.0/?lang=en#/pht6be18f93

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Answer 3

Atlantax Author

Level 1

29 points

Nov 3, 2015 5:50 PM in response to léonie

OK, thank you very much. One other point though....all the photos I take with my iPhone only show up in PHOTOS. So, I take a photo with my phone, I have iCloud Photo Library setup so they zip up to the cloud then down to my Mac and into the Photos APP. After that, they do NOT show up in ALL PHOTOS, only in the PHOTOS view. Kind of counterintuitive? Why is this?

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