iOS 18 and the latest iPhone 16 series have been available for three months. With these updates, there are two major complaints from users: the new design of the Photos app sucks and the library never stops indexing.
While this isn’t necessarily an issue regarding iPhone 16 devices, I couldn’t help but connect these two pieces of information. For example, since I purchased the iPhone 16 Pro Max when it was first released, my Photos app library is still being indexed and I know the process is not complete because many results from search are incomplete compared to older devices.
Obviously, I’m not the only one who noticed this problem persisting all this time. On RedditSeveral people are commenting on the “Indexing your library” bug in the Photos app.
As long as I’ve checked occasionally over the last 4 years, Photos with its poor photo subject search says “Indexing Your Library” at the bottom of the search results page. I always assumed this meant the result didn’t yet include the entire library in its search. But… he continued to show this message even now.
iOS 18.1 and later will probably add transformer-powered search so I can find even more obscure things with natural language, but I’m worried that something is wrong with my library that is preventing it from completing indexing.
People commented on this thread up to a month ago and complained that their media was still indexed weeks after they updated their phones or upgraded them to new iPhone 16 models.
It’s not clear if Apple is aware of the bug. Even when I had a 1TB iPhone 15 Pro with all my media stored locally, the phone continued to index for months. With a 256GB iPhone 16 Pro Max and all my media on iCloud, it seems like it will never end.
The problem is that technically, Apple Intelligence should take advantage of this indexed data to offer me more precise searches. But if this never ends, Apple Intelligence results will continue to be lacking.
Unfortunately, it all depends on Apple recognizing and fixing this recurring problem. On the other hand, the best trick is to keep the Photos app open and charge your iPhone with Wi-Fi enabled. Maybe this will help the Photos app finish indexing your photos someday, but it hasn’t worked for me yet.
Conclude
Are you experiencing the “Indexing your library” issue with your Photos app in iOS 18? Send me a message at [email protected].
