Cannot see photos in Iphone folder in Windows Explorer

Just ran into same (and frustrating) problem... Running Win7 64 bit system and got it solved. I hope...

Work around I found is:

Plug in iPhone (mine's a 6), and Windows Auto Play window should pop up. When it does, select Import pictures and videos (NOT open device to view files). Another window will open up showing import progress. After doing this I was able to open Windows Explorer and see my iPhone's internal storage, specifically the DCIM folder where photos are stored. I was just selecting "open device to view files" originally and this did not work. I could see "Owner's iPhone" and "Internal Storage" below it in the explorer tree, but when I clicked on "Internal Storage", nothing would show up in the viewing pane. Selecting the import option when plugging in my iPhone seems to have solved the problem. Hope this helps...

I just had an employee stop by with the same issue. He said he has been importing photos from his iPhone 6 to Windows 7 for "years" and then it suddenly stopped. I probably spent an hour messing with different things, but I finally found the solution. I uninstalled "Apple mobile device support" from Add/Remove programs, plugged the phone back in, and it reinstalled the "Apple mobile device support" in less than 3 seconds and then it came up on the screen asking what you would like to do with the device (import, open folder, etc.). Hopefully this helps!

If you're using iCloud photo library and optimize storage, then this is expected behavior. You'll need to download iCloud for Windows to download your photos from iCloud to your windows PC.

In my case, I had to click the "trust computer" button on phone...then unplug the phone, replug it back in...then Windows let me navigate the DCIM folder of the phone!

I found the solution from madrivergirl was the one that worked for me. The folder will be in the My Pictures>Camera Roll folder if you're using a PC. Copying any random pic file to that folder suddenly let me start viewing my Camera Roll. Several other solutions I found might be helpful to other people with this issue.

One potential solution that worked for me temporarily is to go on your iPhone in Settings>General>Reset and click Reset Location & Privacy. This will of course cause you to be prompted to confirm permissions in almost all your iOS apps again. But it also seems to solve the problem.

Of course powering off and on your phone and your computer can also help.

Another less likely possibility is that the computer does not have the Apple Mobile Support program installed or it needs resetting. Restart the Apple Mobile Device Service (AMDS) on Windows - Apple Support This utility is automatically installed with iTunes.

I found a solution that worked for me in someone's post on this forum from 2012!

The suggestion was to make sure that on your pc you have at least one photo in the folder titled "Camera Roll". Put any photo that you have on your pc into that folder. Then disconnect and reconnect your iphone to your computer.

Once I did this, I was able to see my iphone in the "File Explorer" and easily copy my photos from my phone to a folder on my computer.

I cannot tell you how long I looked for a solution to this issue! So happy that I can again get photos off of my phone!

Martinccall's solution above worked for me. Connect the iPhone in an open state and with iTunes closed.

For me it worked when I kept my phone unlocked and connected to computer.

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Could be a plot by Apple 👿. We Mac user's have never had this simplicity. We have to use Photo app to get our photos off an idevice.

Here are some work-arounds.

There are lots of ways of moving files.

A simple and popular way to copy files and share files among your devices.

https://www.dropbox.com/

"Box lets you store all of your content online, so you can access, manage and share it from anywhere. Integrate Box with Google Apps and Salesforce and access Box on mobile devices" Rated the most secure cloud storage by SkyHigh Networks. You can buy a license to run box one of your servers.

https://www.box.com/

"iMazing is the all purpose iOS management software: expand your control over your mobile data beyond what is normally possible, without jailbreaking your device. With iMazing, you can easily browse and manage your backups, extract and print your text messages, or drag and drop songs to your iPhone. To put it simply, iMazing allows you to go way beyond what iTunes offers"

https://imazing.com/

Files Connect -- "Cloud Storage services like Dropbox, MobileMe iDisk, Google Docs/Picasa, Facebook photos, FTP, SFTP, WebDAV ... AFS (Apple File Shares) SMB (Windows shares) protocols"

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/files-connect/id404324302?mt=8

Windows File server

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/filebrowser-access-files-on/id364738545?mt=8

"Dukto is a simple application that allows you to share files between devices connected to the same (wireless) LAN network."

http://www.tidal.it/?page_id=309&lang=en

http://www.msec.it/blog/?page_id=11

This is what worked for me. Thank you madrivergirl. It had to be a .jpg phone wasn't recognized with a .png in camera roll. Or maybe it was the fact that the phone was past the lock screen already when I plugged in into USB?

Now if I could only go from PC to the Iphone the same way.

Here's my problem and how I removed it. I plug my phone into my computer and I open a Apple folder or it does not show it ... reinstalling and installing the drivers and still not opening a devices manager and searching for a portable device > Apple > Driver > Update Driver > Browse my computer for driver software> >let me pick from list > MTB USB DEVICE . and nothing happens then I got into the iTunes program and gave me sync photos and videos and all the pictures and video came up and my phone was connected without any problem with the computer 🙂

Same issue - and my guess is the same, an iOS issue not MS. Before iOS11, I could plug my iPhone 6s into my Win10 PC (in any state) and File Explorer would ALWAYS show the iPhone, the Internal Storage folder, the DCIM sub folder, and one or more other subfolders with the picture contents of the Camera Roll folder on the phone. Now, it only displays the iPhone and Internal Storage folders - nothing else. UNLESS, you attach the phone in an open state - then it works just like it used to. Thanks Apple, but ios "improvements" like this we just don't need. My Mum would have said "...leave well enough alone.."...

No, and no. And I seldom use iTunes either. I just plug the phone into the PC, and transfer the pictures. Worked great for the past several years through iOS 8,9,and 10 - until iOS 11.

Also can't use Field Test mode to see dBm signal strength anymore either, but that's a different annoyance... ;-(

Yes Apple, what is up with that? disabling my device so it no longer shows up in windows explorer? I want to move some photos over and now I can't? Please fix whatever you messed up with the latest O/S version so it works the way it used to. Or at least publish the solution to this problem.

My solution is to connect the iPhone in an open state and with iTunes closed. Windows Explorer then shows the iPhone and Windows Photos will now import as it recognises the device. I think this is a bug/security feature in a recent version of iTunes it used to be OK a few months ago. If iTunes is already running from a previous Sync then my iPhone is only visible to iTunes, also the same if my iPhone is not open. This is weird and annoying, but not as bad as some solutions where people switch between driver software for Syncing and importing photos.