iPad stuck curating photos after 15.1 update

[Morac]

After upgrading from iPadOS 15.0.2 to 15.1 on my iPad Pro 11 (1st gen), I noticed that the Photos app was curating photos. When I noticed it, it appeared to be nearly finished as the bar was up to the “w” in “power” in the text (see below). Well it’s still at the same spot after having been plugged in for over 12 hours.

I‘ve tried rebooting but that didn’t appear to make a difference. It also was rescanning People, but that finished already.

I actually noticed this after updating to Monterey on my Mac and seeing it was also curating photos and looked to be stuck. I repaired the photo library on my Mac and it finished curating in under 12 hours. My iPhone 12 Pro Max must have already finished since I never saw it curate photos. My iPad is still going.

Short of deleting all photos or restoring the iPad, is there any way to repair or reset this process?

Of note, I lost the Shared with You on my iPad after upgrading to 15.1, but it came back a couple of days later on its own. I don’t know if that’s part of “curating” or not.

 

[asafishkin]

I'm having the exact same issue with my iPhone 11 Pro!
Ever since updating to iOS 15...
Tried toggling off iCloud photo library, logout of iCloud account, clean install of IOS... Nothing worked for me.
After scanning all faces and taking few new photos - the iPhone starts curating again and gets stuck at the exact same spot (in my case between the O and W).
Very frustrating

 

[Morac]

Mine’s still stuck in the same spot, but it seems to be curating things anyway as my featured photo changed today and new photos are getting enhanced info. Though that could be coming through iCloud. It is scanning faces as periodically it says it needs to do that and then it goes away after leaving it plugged in for awhile. The only thing that never finishes is curating photos.

On a side note, my Mac decided it wanted to curate photos again today. I plugged it in and it finished. I think Photos curates periodically.

It seems to be used to pick the photo to display in the Year and Month view as those differ on all my devices.

 

[Morac]

Still stuck 2 months later in the same spot in iPadOS 15.2

 

[asafishkin]

Same here.
I've contacted Apple Support over the phone trying to fix the issue, but eventually they've stopped calling me back.

 

[Morac]

I fixed this my erasing my iPad (back when it has 15.2.1) and restoring the iCloud backup.