iOS Photo Select Slow after iCloud Photo Library download?

r1nzl3r

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Hello everyone,

So I went ahead and uploaded my full library of photos and videos to iCloud Photo Library (about 110+GB). On the Mac side, the Photos app works great. On iOS, everything seems OK until I have to select a photo from the photo gallery in a 3rd party app.

Example: Open Instagram, choose photo from photo library and the device hangs for about 7-8 seconds..sometimes longer to access my photo library.

I understand I have a huge photo library on my device, but it's optimized which means it should be nothing but thumbnails unless I downloaded the full images. I've gone into a few albums to look at old pictures and those did download but I haven't gone crazy with it. This happens with pretty much any 3rd party app that I go into my photo library with.

Has anyone had this issue? Maybe it's time for me to do a restore and start from scratch?

Any thoughts/opinions/solutions would be a great help. Thank you!
 

Just_Me_D

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Could it be the Instagram app preparing itself and its servers to receive your pics?
 

r1nzl3r

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This is when I am trying to pick a photo from my library to upload to Instagram. Before using iCloud library, when I hit the photo library button to choose my photos it would show my library instantly. Now it lags and hangs for about 8-9 seconds.
 

r1nzl3r

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that is completely stupid if that's the case. Especially if it's photos that I literally just saved from the internet and photos that I recently took with my iPhone itself. This could cause many issues for those trying to uploading photos via 3rd party apps if their iCloud Photo Library is large.
 

auntiewiv

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Whatsapp has the same problem. I think it's the phone downloading the full res version of the picture on demand. If you turn off optimise iPhone storage in iCloud settings that would speed things up, but if, you have a large photo library you are going to run into space issues.
 

mad_minifi

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So I went ahead and uploaded my full library of photos and videos to iCloud Photo Library (about 110+GB). On the Mac side, the Photos app works great. On iOS, everything seems OK until I have to select a photo from the photo gallery in a 3rd party app.

Example: Open Instagram, choose photo from photo library and the device hangs for about 7-8 seconds..sometimes longer to access my photo library.
Thanks! I thought I was the famous "only one" experiencing this problem. In my case my iCloud photo library is about 70GB in size and I have the exact same problem.

I absolutely understand that to send a specific photo (that isn't available in full resolution on my iPhone due to the "optimise storage setting") every app has to wait for a few seconds (or ideally shorter, depending on the connection of course) but WhatsApp literally freezes for 60 seconds on my iPhone when I select a photo. This is crazy....

Other 3rd party messaging apps (like Telegram) work perfectly fine: I tap on the photo I'd like to send and it takes no more than 1-3 seconds to download the photo and send it.

I think that WhatsApp (and other apps experiencing this problem) have to implement new/different photo picker APIs and haven't been updated to work perfectly with iCloud photo library. I hope they catch up pretty soon, it's ridiculous and annoying as hell.
 

John Yester

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Ya I have been seeing this since 8.2 Doesn't matter on Application. It's even slow in native messaging application. Choosing photo library to choose a picture to send it hangs on loading. Now I have over 7K in pictures local on device.
 
Apr 21, 2015
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Thanks! I thought I was the famous "only one" experiencing this problem. In my case my iCloud photo library is about 70GB in size and I have the exact same problem.

I absolutely understand that to send a specific photo (that isn't available in full resolution on my iPhone due to the "optimise storage setting") every app has to wait for a few seconds (or ideally shorter, depending on the connection of course) but WhatsApp literally freezes for 60 seconds on my iPhone when I select a photo. This is crazy....

Other 3rd party messaging apps (like Telegram) work perfectly fine: I tap on the photo I'd like to send and it takes no more than 1-3 seconds to download the photo and send it.

I think that WhatsApp (and other apps experiencing this problem) have to implement new/different photo picker APIs and haven't been updated to work perfectly with iCloud photo library. I hope they catch up pretty soon, it's ridiculous and annoying as hell.


Same problem here, whatsapp literally freezes itself when I select a photo! With Telegram this problem doesn't exist, but whatsapp it's really tedious!
 

mad_minifi

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Good news everyone!

Today's WhatsApp update (2.12.1) brought a new photo picker and the "freeze" is almost completely gone. It now takes approximately 1-2 seconds after tapping a photo - absolutely acceptable for me. :)
 

Rolobo

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I'm definitely running into this in a bad way with instagram too. It won't populate the picker for what seems like forever.
 

mad_minifi

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I'm definitely running into this in a bad way with instagram too. It won't populate the picker for what seems like forever.

Are you using the latest Instagram version/update? I have about 70.000 photos in my library and the picker populates within 3-5 seconds
 

Rolobo

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I have about 42,000 photos and it takes about 18 seconds to populate on an iPhone 5s. I'm using the latest OS and Instagram versions. Are others here on a iPhone 6?
 

AllredRN

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As others said, in some ways it's nice to know this isn't just a "me" thing. Been driving me nuts. Was going to erase and restore my phone...not anymore. Looks like app devs need to update their apps to help in this process.

Thanks for everyone's posts.
 

Armin Kuhestani

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I am having the same issue. When I take pictures, it sometimes takes ages to show in "All photos". If I want to send pictures in "Line" then the app photos load very slowly and it takes me over a minute to be even able to select a picture. Same with Instagram.
 

Mike Steed

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My problem is with simply viewing photos in my camera roll. Attempting to view a picture requires it to "download" before I get the picture in full resolution. Even when I have taken the photo recently, going back to it requires it to VERY slowly load. It's frustrating and almost embarrassing when I'm showing someone pictures on my phone. We stand there waiting on a photo in my camera roll to load properly. Sometimes an exclamation point in a circle appears when the photo won't fully load. I'm just out of luck when that happens. Is this happening because of the "optimize storage" setting?
 

Ledsteplin

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My problem is with simply viewing photos in my camera roll. Attempting to view a picture requires it to "download" before I get the picture in full resolution. Even when I have taken the photo recently, going back to it requires it to VERY slowly load. It's frustrating and almost embarrassing when I'm showing someone pictures on my phone. We stand there waiting on a photo in my camera roll to load properly. Sometimes an exclamation point in a circle appears when the photo won't fully load. I'm just out of luck when that happens. Is this happening because of the "optimize storage" setting?

Have you tried a hard reset?
Hold the top power/sleep button and the home button at the same time until the Apple logo appears, then release.
If that doesn't work, try Reset All Settings.
Reset All Settings
Go to Settings >General >Reset >Reset All Settings. This resets to default everything in Settings, including notifications, alerts, brightness, and clock settings like wake up alarms.

Last resort: Restore your phone as new! Not from a back up.
 

Mike Steed

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Thanks guys. I turned off the "Optimize Storage" option and I do believe that's solved the issue. While initially I have to download the picture back to my phone, after returning to it it seems to be stored locally again. I'm also receiving low storage warnings again. Unfortunately I have the stupid 16Gb model because it was all that was available. So I lost a lot of content from my previous 64Gb but that's irrelevant. Seems that if I want to store a large number of photos/videos/Live Photos I'll have to optimize my storage. A necessary evil I suppose. So anyone else having this problem and not knowing why, this is it.