Photos not recognising faces
Q Why doesn’t facial recognition ever complete scanning my Photos library on my MacBook Pro?
AFor the Photos app to recognise people’s faces in the images in your library, it has to work through analysing each image first. This is performed by the background service photoanalysisd, which only runs when your Mac is awake, is connected to mains power rather than running off battery, and the Photos app itself is closed.
Even then it may not kick in for a while, as it often takes its time getting going.
When your Photos library is large, with many images of people, it can take several days to complete its first run, but once that’s finished, analysing updates is usually quicker. Open Activity Monitor and sort the process names alphabetically to make it easier to spot photoanalysisd and its sister background process photolibraryd to see when they’re active. You may find you need to disable sleep in the Energy Saver pane and leave your MacBook Pro running quietly over a weekend.