Apple Photos Will Not Import

[iubhounds]

I updated macOS to Ventura yesterday afternoon. I always export my photos from iPhone by wireless airdrop to my iMac. By default they move into "Downloads". Today when I try to import those photos to my Apple Photos on my iMac, it will show me the photos available for import and after I click the button to import, nothing happens.

When I start the process again a small screen tells me there is another import in process and once that is finished the photos will be imported. I am talking only 5 photos I am trying to import.

4 hours later, same small screen message.

I have tried the following:

Closed Photos and turned off iMac. Turned iMac back on, opened Photos and tried importing again. Nothing happens.

 

[iubhounds]

Apple support was very helpful. Backed up my huge photo library to an external drive that took hours to complete.
Repaired Apple Photos library on iMac.
A hard reboot and everything worked as it should.

 

[iubhounds]

Update --- things have changed.

This afternoon I was right back at the starting point with the same issue. I called Apple Support again. He told me at the end of the call he had two callers today that had similar issues with Apple Photos once they upgraded to Ventura and what he told me to do worked for them.

-- confirmed my backup I did last night Photos Library on a different external drive worked
-- went to SSD external drive the library was located that didn't work, APFS format was verified and then I erased it
-- go to Finder drop and drag backup file to the new reformatted SSD drive

I am still waiting for that to complete but the support tech said that did fix the photos problem for the other two callers.

 

[chabig]

My observation from these forums is that most of the problems along these lines are reported by people who refuse to use iCloud. Apple has been moving us in that direction for quite a while and I suspect things will only get worse for the holdouts.

 

[iubhounds]

My observation from these forums is that most of the problems along these lines are reported by people who refuse to use iCloud. Apple has been moving us in that direction for quite a while and I suspect things will only get worse for the holdouts.

And I am a hold out ... I will never put my 83,000 photos on the cloud. You have a very valid point though.