Now that there is a dedicated app and active development in the Photos space, does HEIC support have a chance of becoming a reality? This really the main thing holding Plex back from being our family’s primary Photo tool.
11 Likes
I could be wrong, but I swear I remember that the photo upload feature in the Plex app would apply lossy compression to all of your photos- completely destroying the integrity of the original photos.
Is this still the case? If so, the following statement shouldn’t be provided to the general public:
Whether you’re reminiscing over family photos or sharing backups of your professional photography images, Plex Photos offers a streamlined experience that is easy to navigate and enjoyable to use.
Source: https://www.plex.tv/blog/the-future-of-plex-focused-streamlined-and-ready-for-feedback/
The ability to chose to upload images in original quality vs compressed is very important, especially with claims of sharing backups. They’re not backups if lossy compression is applied.
I’m looking forward to first class photos support though. Live photos, HEIC, albums, etc would be great in a standalone app.
8 Likes
Three things;
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Plex server and client apps have had an ongoing issue with reading the video orientation Exif data on mobile phone videos causing some videos to display upside down. This behavior has been brought over into this new standalone “photos” app. This app is useless for home videos that exist in photo albums until this is fixed.
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The original Plex client apps display photos at a very low resolution causing the photos to look awful on large screen 4K TV’s. If it doesn’t already, can this new “Photos” app display the photos at their original resolution, or at least 4K?
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Users have been asking for custom slideshow settings for years (time per photo, etc) , can this be implemented in the new app?
Also please have a “Plex Photos” app for the Nvidia Shield.
5 Likes
Sure these have been suggested.
- Choose landing page. Id like to start on Library page.
- Change view on Library page, show them as how they show on recommended page.
- Choose folder picture easily.
2 Likes
Agree with all above. Nicely put.
1 Like
I was hoping that I could use this to copy my photos from my phone to my plex server. This doesn’t seem to be the case at this time. I would love to have this feature added and maybe an auto upload to server function added as well.
4 Likes
Few problem:
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Signin page would go away when I change the app to get my Authentication Code. I had to email the backup code and type it out.
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As others have already mentioned, first loading is too long or broken. I have force stop app and restart, that will work quickly.
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Are there any plans to allow for a mobile upload? Is that something this project will go towards or not at all.
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Non standard Aspects ratios images fails to load without any error. I have bunch of 10000 x 3600 images that just won’t work.
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Cannot zoom in/out in Timeline.
Everything else seems very fluid. Photos open very quickly, scrolling is smooth. Main point is 3rd. This is a big potential to replace Google/Apple cloud photos. Many features can be added but main one for now is to allow upload from Mobile devices.
Phone: Samsung S23 Ultra
OS: Android 14
Plex Photos v0.2.0
Plex Media Server 1.41.0.8992
2 Likes
I can’t sign in as each time I leave the app for my 2fa code, it starts the sign in process over
2 Likes
Thank you for the efforts on improving photos support in plex.
For this to be of any real use for me and my family, I would like to see (a return) to phone to PMS photo syncing.
Not only for the server admin, but also for my shared users.
Phone to PMS photo sync should include user side options for private and public/shared photo classifications.
IE, shared users (ie non-admins) by default can (IF THEY CHOOSE TO) sync their photos to my server to their own private section of the admin created photo library. Users can then decide to mark photos or groups of photos as shared/public (to other shared users).
It should also explicitly tell those users that the server admin will always have access to any uploaded photos, but other shared users will not have access unless the photos have been marked as public/shared.
Sharing should also be flexible enough to share to specific users or to all users of the server.
For example, family users may want to share with other or all other family users, but not users outside of the family. They may also want to keep some/all photos private.
7 Likes
This would be my #1 request. I have 10+ years of photos not on my Google photos account. Being able to quickly access and share those previous offline photos would be a game changer.
Very close second feature needed would be facial recognition so I don’t have to go through those 10+ years looking for photos of a specific person.
4 Likes
Hello, glad to see Photos get some love on Plex.
I’d love for some (hopefully local) image recognition for searching specific items (i.e. Red Bus).
I think it would be helpful to have a slider appear on the Timeline and album pages when scrolling. Ideally with dates appearing when used. It can take a long time to scroll through currently and without much accuracy.
Also, landscape mode is currently broken when viewing photos, and the UI obscures a lot of screen while horizontal in the menus.
1 Like
Thank you for dedicating the resource to improving Photos in Plex. This is so, so exciting. 
As a family we have been trying to replace and sunset our usage of Google Photos for years and looking at various alternatives unsuccessfully. Storage space costs and privacy concerns and needing separate accounts always become an issue with the various solutions, but could be easily addressed with Plex as the replacement given we already manage a PMS and share it with family. 
One key feature that my partner always raises as a requirement to replacing Google Photos is allowing users the photos are shared with commenting.
Is the ability to add comments on photos planned to be included in Plex Photos eventually? I’d be so happy to start the journey today if it’s anywhere on the roadmap!
2 Likes
Hey really looking forward to this project. Currently I use Immich, which I love, but my family already uses Plex so it would be so easy for them to migrate over to this. As someone else mentioned, if you don’t have a photos library already, it would be nice to at least inform you and better give you the option to create a library. The infinite spinny wheel is not great.
Some other features I would love:
- Face Recognition and allow selection of models
- Object detection
- Commenting and sharing
- Stacking of “Burst” photos
- NSFW filters
- Mobile upload/sync
- User access control
- Slideshow option (library is still creating so not sure if this is an option now)
- Sorting/filter options
- Map View
- Memories Support
Sorry for the long list! Thought I’d get it in early. Looking forward to the refocus on personal media libraries instead of the other stuff!
7 Likes
Switching Photo Libraries doesn’t take me to the one that I clicked on, it takes me to the next one instead. I have approximately 20 photo libraries and it will go to the next library regardless of which one I choose.
Is there plans for this functionality to be implemented?
Would be rather cool to have the functionality back (and a seamless way to view photos on the “big screen”)
Unless I’m missing something, there really isn’t any functionality to this app besides looking at the photos correct? I can’t download them to the phone, share them with anyone etc
The one good news is, it does support RAW images.
Chromecast support?
1 Like
Autofill seems to be broken on the embedded webpage (native login would be nicer or at least like Plexamp)
Pixel Android 14
Timeline is extremely slow every time I open. Doesn’t seem like it’s getting cached.
1 Like
Can you fix it so that Plex actually reads the XMP Metadata from my photos? Even if it’s just the date taken, that’s better than nothing else. I’m tired of photos I edited yesterday, then fixed the Metadata for manually, still showing up as taken yesterday in the timeline. But sorting by tags and stuff within the app would also be nice in the future as well.
3 Likes
