Photos won't upload to iCloud.

I'm hoping someone can help me. I activated iCloud Photo Library a few weeks ago and zero photos have uploaded to iCloud. It's active on both my MacBook Air and iPhone 6. I have tried logging out of iCloud and powering off both devices several times. My MacBook Air has been stuck on "Uploading 8,221 Items" since I began, and the situation is the same on my iPhone for its number of items. Neither number changes and the uploading progress bar on my MacBook Air has not begun to display any colored progress. I leave the MBA powered on at night with the screen dimmed. I have plenty of GB purchased in iCloud. I have also tried manually uploading photos on iCloud.com (which is empty), but get the message "There was a problem uploading this photo. Try uploading the photo again later," for every photo I try uploading. Any ideas?

MacBook Air (13-inch Mid 2013), OS X El Capitan (10.11.2)

Posted on Dec 28, 2015 10:57 PM

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16 replies

Jun 21, 2018 1:08 AM in response to jbenjaminb

I have a similar problem to this and have been dealing with Apple Tech Support with this since July 2015 it is getting frustrating. They have reset my account a number of times and the problem returns.

Dec 29, 2015 6:26 AM in response to jbenjaminb

I encountered a similar situation. What helped for me was this -- Use the Photos library repair tool - Apple Support. I also found that initially, when you're uploading this large a library to iCloud, it will take some time to upload and it's all dependent on your network/bandwidth. My library which was over 7000 took a couple days to upload.


Try the suggestions in that link and see if there's any changes, and if not, feel free to return to your post to post results.

Jan 25, 2016 5:41 AM in response to zinacef

Hi, I have exactly the same problem. Photo's will not upload on both my iPad and iPhone to the iCloud Photo Library. The Photostream also does not work. I do not have a Mac, so repairing the photo library won't work. As the problem is the same on both my iPhone and iPad, the problem seems to be related to the iCloud service?


Anyone for another solution?

Jan 25, 2016 7:58 AM in response to zinacef

Yes, and that didn't work either.


It remains saying: 'uploading 1.072 items'. It sometimes briefly flashes to something else (not readable).


Seems like something is blocking it from uploading. As this situation is the same on my iPhone and iPad, my thought was that it has something to do with iCloud itself (or my storage in particular).

Jan 25, 2016 10:48 AM in response to jbenjaminb

An update on my progress....

I've been in contact with Apple support for the past three weeks as they try to solve the issue. It is a problem on Apple's end. They came to this conclusion because (besides unable to upload using the photos app on my iPhone and Mac) I am also unable to upload any photos to iCloud via the photos interface on iCloud.com using different web browsers, wifi networks, and ISPs.

Jan 25, 2016 12:15 PM in response to jbenjaminb

Uploading photo's from a browser on iCloud.com does work with me. But it says first: 'initializing photo library'. So it seems that activating photo library on both my PC, my iPhone and my iPad did not activate the photo library at iCloud.com! I uploaded one photo successfully from my PC via the browser.


I then logged of from iCloud from my iPad and iPhone and logged on again. But they still are refusing to upload and download photo's...

Feb 23, 2016 12:26 PM in response to jbenjaminb

I have decided to give up on iCloud Photo Library. After nearly two months of working with Apple support, they have not been able to find a solution to this problem. During this time they had full access to my account. I did not feel comfortable allowing access for that amount of time, and decided two months was long enough. I will return to Flickr for my cloud photo storage.

Feb 23, 2016 2:14 PM in response to jbenjaminb

jbenjaminb wrote:


I have decided to give up on iCloud Photo Library. After nearly two months of working with Apple support, they have not been able to find a solution to this problem. During this time they had full access to my account. I did not feel comfortable allowing access for that amount of time, and decided two months was long enough. I will return to Flickr for my cloud photo storage.

Kinda the same sentiment I have about iCloud/iCloud Photos as well which is why I primarily use a third-party application for my photo storage needs like you're doing though not the same application.

Apr 2, 2016 1:12 PM in response to jbenjaminb

Hi, I have the same problem. The most frustrating thing that I can’t upload any photo directly to iCloud.com. I'm trying to upload something every day for about a couple of weeks but everytime I receive the same message: "There was a problem uploading this photo. Try uploading the photo again later". I don't even touch iCloud Library on my devices (iPhone 6s and Macbook Pro 2014) because I think the problem inside iCloud account.

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Photos won't upload to iCloud.

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