Photos from iPhone are no longer being shown on iPad.

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TonyMan13 Author

Level 1

69 points

Photos from iPhone are no longer being shown on iPad.

After my iPhone upgraded to iOS 26, new photos taken are not showing up on my iPad. The iPad is also running iOS 26.

iPad, iPadOS 26

Posted on Dec 10, 2025 6:57 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Richard.Taylor

Level 6

17,011 points

Dec 10, 2025 7:16 AM in response to TonyMan13

Photos syncing is done through iCloud. Are both devices signed in to the same iCloud account? When you access your account at iCloud.com, do you see the new pictures there?

How much free storage is available on the iPhone?

How much free storage is available on the iPad?

How much free storage is available at iCloud?

There should be at least 10% of the storage free at each place.

Do you have “Optimize Storage” checked in Settings>[name]>iCloud>Photos on the iPhone?

Do you have “Optimize Storage” checked in Settings>[name]>iCloud>Photos on the iPad?

Have you tried a Forced re-start on the two devices?

Force restart iPhone - Apple Support

Force Re-start iPad

This is different from a simple Power Off. I had to continue holding the button down past the "slide to power off" message, and then I released the button only after the Apple Logo appeared indicating a re-start.

Let us know…

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Answer 2

TonyMan13 Author

Level 1

69 points

Dec 10, 2025 1:36 PM in response to TonyMan13

well it looks good now! I did the forced restart on both devices. When the phone came back up , under iCloud it said the sync had completed, so wondering if that fixed it before the reset. All the photos are now on both devices and on icloud.com. Hopefully that is the end of it.

Thanks for the help.

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Answer 3

TonyMan13 Author

Level 1

69 points

Dec 10, 2025 1:30 PM in response to Richard.Taylor

Kinda real confused no. First of all, I have plenty of storage left on both devices and on iCloud. I've never done much with iCloud, not not really that great at understanding the settings. I do have optimize set on both devices.

When I go i cloud.com, the new photos are not there. These were taken after the iOS 26 upgrade on the phone.

On the phone it says iCloud has 1,645 Photos, 63 Videos. I told it to sync now and it still says it's syncing, 15 minutes later.

On the iPad it says iCloud ha 1647 Photos and 65 Videos and it synced 7 minutes ago.

I'm going to try the forced restart on both devices.

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Answer 4

TonyMan13 Author

Level 1

69 points

Dec 10, 2025 9:36 AM in response to Richard.Taylor

Thanks, I will check all that later today and report back.

It just seems strange that I never had this issue until my iPhone was upgraded to iOS 26 two days ago.

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Answer 5

Dec 10, 2025 11:39 AM in response to TonyMan13

An upgrade could have affected a number of things I mentioned. My iPad is running well on 26.1. Rumor has it that 26.2 is coming out soon, so things will change again…

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Answer 6

Dec 11, 2025 6:36 AM in response to TonyMan13

Sounds great!

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