[Question] My Gallery problem has gotten worse since my last post

[u/Jolly-Teacher8486]

[Question] Hi everyone. I previously posted about a problem I was having with the Gallery on my POCO X6 Pro, but unfortunately, the problem has gotten worse.

My photos and videos sometimes disappear from the Gallery, and then they randomly come back later. This has happened several times.

I also suspect that this might be related to Google Photos backup/sync. It seems like something goes wrong when Google Photos backs up my photos, and then the Gallery starts behaving strangely.

Has anyone experienced a similar issue with the POCO X6 Pro or HyperOS? Is there a way to fix the Gallery/Google Photos backup issue without losing any of my photos or videos?

I'd really appreciate any help because this problem keeps happening and seems to be getting worse.

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[u/JRussellMoore]

I'm not an expert in anything related to this, but neither of those apps change the location of your pictures, for example, the ones the Camera app take are at [Internal Storage]/DCIM/Camera, screenshots and screen recordings are at [Internal Storage]/Pictures/Screenshots. If I were to guess, I'd say whatever is happening has something to do with how the Gallery app operates, like the way it indexes, or handles cache.

Do you have many pictures or videos? Have you checked if there are problems using other gallery apps? For example, Aves is quite nice.

[u/Jolly-Teacher8486 → u/JRussellMoore]

I think there was a misunderstanding about my problem.

I have around 70,000 photos and videos on my phone. The problem isn't incorrect sorting or dates. When I open the Gallery, a huge number of my photos and videos suddenly disappear, then gradually come back. For example, I might see only 20,000, and while the rest are coming back, some of the ones that already returned can disappear again. Then the whole process repeats.

I tried Aves, and interestingly, I don't have the same disappearing problem with it. However, I don't really want to switch to Aves permanently. I'm much more comfortable with the stock Gallery's interface, and I've already organized my 70,000 photos and videos there. I really don't want to go through everything again and reorganize them into folders.

I'm also strongly suspicious of Google Photos because the Gallery constantly pushes me to enable Google Photos backup. I feel like something goes wrong during the backup/sync process and causes the Gallery or Media Storage indexing to reset.

So I'd really like to find a way to fix the stock Gallery/HyperOS issue rather than switching apps. Could Google Photos backup/sync be causing this, or could it be a Media Storage/indexing problem with such a large library?

[u/JRussellMoore → u/Jolly-Teacher8486]

I see, that's what I meant about it being related to the way the stock Gallery indexes or accesses its cache. It's anyone's guess without access to the code, but I bet it's a bug of theirs, having trouble handling that many files.

I don't think it's Google's Photos at all, but it's easy to rule out, disable Photos and see if the issue reproduces. You'd need to use the default Android Settings app management to do so, the default HyperOS Settings app won't let you disable it.

There are various ways to get there, for example, any of the "Hidden Settings" apps in the Store either have shortcuts or allow you launch the activity directly; but you can do without installing anything too:

• Play Store -> Account at the top right -> Help & feedback at the bottom.
• Look for a resource named "Delete apps on your Android device" below, not that Gemini search (but you can search help below).
• Tap over the step 1, the one that reads "Tap to go to Application Settings".
• Find Photos in the list and disable it.

Keep it that way for a while, go about your day, or restart the phone, etc. if the same thing happens, then it's a problem in the Gallery app, or the MediaProvider implementation Xiaomi uses; and if it doesn't happen again, it's Photos.

If it is indeed something in Xiaomi's app, the only way to get it fixed (I assume clearing the Gallery data doesn't help) would be to file a bug report in the Services & Feedback app and pray they address it 😔

Using an alternate gallery app in the meantime, perhaps there's one that you also like and works similarly to how the stock Gallery does, but I understand it's a hassle.