If you don’t like the Photos app launching every time you connect your iPhone to your Mac, here’s how to prevent it from happening.
Introduced in a recent update of OS X Yosemite, the Photos Mac app provides a better interface for managing your photo collection. It essentially replaces iPhoto and Aperture, and while some users still rely on Aperture for their photography needs, the new Photos app is great for casual users and does the job just fine.
The app can sync with your iCloud Photo Library; This means that any photos you take on your iPhone will be automatically synced to the Photos Mac app so that the pictures are instantly available on your computer. From here, you can edit photos directly from within the app on your Mac.
You can also do a number of other things within the app, such as sharing photos with friends and family, and even creating physical greeting cards and photo books.
However, if you don’t use the app that often (or don’t use it at all), it seems a little pointless that your iPhone has to start up every time you plug it in, and if you’re reading this now, it’s probably one of those users.
Here’s how to stop Photos from opening when you plug your iPhone into your Mac.
When you connect your iPhone to your computer, it’s often because you just want to charge your device instead of syncing your iTunes library or managing your photo collection. If you’re like me, you don’t use iTunes and use Photos only occasionally when you have new photos you take with your iPhone (even then I use iCloud Photo Library to access them on my Mac, rather than plugging my iPhone).
So, just follow these few simple steps to stop Photos from opening when you plug in your iPhone.
You can now turn off Photos and the app will no longer open every time you plug in your iPhone.
You can also use the Image Capture tool to customize this setting. In the lower left corner of the Image Capture window there will be a setting that says a drop down menu. You can choose any app you want, so every time you plug in your iPhone, the app will open automatically.
You can also do this for individual memory cards in cameras, so if you want Lightroom to open automatically when you insert your DSLR’s memory card, you can set this up, but any other memory card you insert can be configured not to open any apps. .
Other Photos Tips
The Photos Mac app looks pretty basic, but there are a few different features you can take advantage of, such as importing photos, editing photos, sharing photos with friends and family, creating greeting cards, and even ordering physical prints of the photos you want. I took it with your iPhone.
Ordering prints is perhaps one of my favorite features, as I love framing photos and hanging them on the wall for all to see. Prices are also very competitive, with 4×6 prints costing just $0.12 each. Using Walgreens, CVS or some other mediocre photo service is definitely an alternative.
However, one thing that kept the Photos Mac app from working at its optimal level has been photo sync issues. Sometimes when you take a photo with your iPhone, it doesn’t show up in the Photos app for Mac. Usually a simple restart of the app fixes the problem temporarily, but there were times when I had to restart my Mac to get it back in place.
One thing to be aware of though is that it may take some time for photos to sync with the Photos Mac app on your iPhone, even if you have a fast internet connection. It seems to be some kind of bug with the app, hopefully Apple fixes it soon, but in the meantime, a simple reboot usually does the trick.
I hope OS X El Capitan fixes many of the issues we saw in OS X Yosemite.
