Location Mac System Photo Library

Your Photos library holds all your photos, albums, slideshows, and print projects. If your library is large, and you want to free up storage space on your Mac, turn on iCloud Photo Library and use Optimize Mac Storage, or move your library to an external drive.

Aug 30, 2011  In the latest versions of iPhoto you will find your pictures stored in the user library Pictures folder inside a self contained Iphoto library package, that file and location is the following: /Pictures/iPhoto Library.photolibrary/Masters/. Apr 29, 2017  So many Mac User keep asking me how do they find their photo after finish syncing in Photo library on Mac. So, I decide to make this video up as. Oct 03, 2017  You could try, if erasing the sandbox (it is in the Containers folder in the user library) will help. But that will cause again a new upload to iCloud, if you are using iCloud Photos Library, because Photos will forget everything you set in the Preferences - the location of the system library. Jun 10, 2010  The Best Way to Organize Your Massive Photo Library By Matthew Braga on June 10, 2010 at 1 p.m. For today's avid shooters, organizing a library of photos. Nov 09, 2018  Go to the location of the Photo library and move it to external drive. Set the external library as a System Photo Library (So whenever you open the Photos app it will open the photos library from the external hard drive.) After completing trasfer to drive, make sure this external drive is connected to your Mac whenever you want to access photos.

Feb 23, 2017  Photos File Location in Mac OS. Photos image files are stored in the following location in Mac OS: /Pictures/Photos Library.photoslibrary/Masters/ The tilde represents the users home directory, if you’re going to use the excellent Go To Folder command to access that directory don’t skip the prefix.

Before you start, be sure to back up your library.

Prepare your drive

You can store your library on an external storage device, such as a USB or Thunderbolt drive formatted as APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled).1 Find out how to check the format of your external storage device.

To prevent data loss, Apple doesn't recommend storing photo libraries on external storage devices like SD cards and USB flash drives, or drives that are shared on a network.

Move your Photos library to an external storage device

  1. Quit Photos.
  2. In the Finder, go to the external drive where you want to store your library.
  3. In another Finder window, find your library. The default location is Users > [username] > Pictures, and it's named Photos Library.
  4. Drag your library to its new location on the external drive. If you see an error, select your external drive's icon in the Finder, then choose File > Get Info. If the information under Sharing & Permissions isn't visible, click , then make sure the 'Ignore ownership on this volume' checkbox is selected. If it's not selected, click to unlock it, enter an administrator name and password, then select the checkbox.2

  5. After the move is finished, double-click Photos Library in its new location to open it.
  6. If you use iCloud Photo Library, designate this library as the System Photo Library.

Delete original library to save space

After you open your library from its new location and make sure that it works as expected, you can delete the library from its original location.

Sync mac books library with ipad. Nov 12, 2019  How to Sync Books Between Mac and iPhone/iPad. Make sure you are using the same Apple ID on all of your devices. The books you have purchased from Books Store are automatically available in Books app across all of your devices. Mar 25, 2020  How to sync photos to your iPhone or iPad on macOS Catalina. If you're using the iCloud Photo Library sync on your iPhone or iPad, you cannot sync photos using your Mac. Click on the Finder app in the Mac Dock. Select your device on the left side of the screen under Devices. On the right-hand side, click on the Photos tab. Determine the files.

In a Finder window, go back to your Pictures folder (or whichever folder you copied your library from) and move Photos Library to the trash. Then choose Finder > Empty Trash to delete the library and reclaim disk space.

Open another Photos library

If you have multiple libraries, here's how to open a different one:

This often revolves around being able to get a full set of your images and movies in iCloud Photo Library if you don’t have enough storage on your Mac startup volume.Macworld reader Shai wrote in with such a concern recently. Enable icloud photo library on mac. It's a service that answers many users’ needs, but there are some not-quite-outlying demands that fall through the cracks. There’s no macOS issue I hear about more than iCloud Photo Library. They have a 300GB media library synced with iCloud Photo Library and a modest disk drive on their MacBook Pro, so Photos for macOS is set to optimize media.

  1. Quit Photos.
  2. Press and hold the Option key while you open Photos.
  3. Select the library that you want to open, then click Choose Library.

Mac System Photo Library

Photos uses this library until you open a different one.

Learn more

If you have a permissions issue with your library, you might be able to resolve the issue by using the Photos library repair tool.

Find Photo Library On Mac

1. You can't move your library to a disk that's used for Time Machine backups.

2. If the volume isn't formatted APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled), or has been used for Time Machine backups but hasn't been erased, this checkbox will either not be present, or won't be selectable after unlocking. Erase and reformat the drive for this option to be available.

Photos in your System Photo Library are available in apps like iMovie, Pages, and Keynote. You can also sync them to iOS devices and view them on Apple TV. And if you want to use your own images as your desktop picture or screen saver, the images need to be in your System Photo Library before you can select them in System Preferences.

If you have only one photo library, then it's the System Photo Library. Otherwise, the first photo library that you create or open in Photos will become the System Photo Library. If you have more than one library, you might need to designate a System Photo Library, so other apps can access the photos and videos you want them to use.

Follow these steps to designate a System Photo Library:

  1. Quit Photos.
  2. Hold down the Option key and open Photos. One of the photo libraries is already designated as YourLibraryName (System Photo Library).
  3. Choose the library you want to designate as the System Photo Library.
  4. After Photos opens the library, choose Photos > Preferences from the menu bar.
  5. Click the General tab.
  6. Click the Use as System Photo Library button.

If you open a second or different library in the Photos app, and you haven't designated it as the System Photo Library, other applications will use photos from the original System Photo Library. Hold down the Option key when you open Photos to see which library is set as the System Photo Library.

Mac Photo Library Location

iCloud and the System Photo Library

You can use iCloud Photos, Shared Albums, and My Photo Stream only with the System Photo Library. If you choose a different library in Photos without designating it as the System Photo Library, the iCloud tab in Photos preferences is disabled:

Location Mac System Photo Library Download

If you designate a new library as the System Photo Library and then turn on iCloud Photos, the photos and videos in the new library will merge with those already in your iCloud Photos. If you want to keep the contents of your photo libraries separate, don’t turn on iCloud Photos for more than one library in Photos.