I’m not sure if it’s just me, but lately I haven’t been able to upload more than six photos at a time for my reviews. It’s frustrating, especially when I’m reviewing a place I visited weeks ago and have to keep scrolling through my photo album to find the photos I want to upload.
Here’s what happens: if I try to upload more than six photos, the review page refreshes on its own and I lose everything - the ratings, the review, and the photos I selected. I have to start all over again. I also need to close and relaunch my phone browser to fully refresh the page, because if I don’t, when I “edit” my review to add more photos, the previously uploaded photos don’t appear.
Does anyone know what’s going on? I used to be able to upload more than 20 photos at once.
Please, try Clear cache & cookies, if you have not done so already. The link has step-by-step instructions for Android, iOS, and desktop. Just select the relevant tab at the top. Also, please try logging out of your Local Guides account and back in, and update your Google Maps app if necessary.
I am not sure to completely understand your issue, or if it has been already fixed.
From your profile I can see that, just an hour ago, you posted a review with 38 photos
I uploaded them in batches of 6 photos at a time. Imagine the total time I had to spend to do this for just 1 review. It’s probably not a big issue if my photos are taken within the last few days. The problem is I have had some delayed reviews.
I am using Safari Browser on my iPhone. I search for the place, go to review tab, and start my entries. I have been doing this for years with no issues. Only found out that the page refreshes itself whenever I tried to select more than 6 photos to add.
My environment is quite different, mostly using Firefox on Windows and posting directly to the list, instead of attaching to review. Since a while uploads fail most of the time using Firefox, but work immediately on Chrome.
(1) I cleared Safari’s cache and re-logged into Google. I then tried to start another review by selecting about 37 photos. After pressing the tick button, the page refreshed itself again. Luckily, I hadn’t written any review yet. Otherwise I would have had to start all over.
(2) I opened Chrome (for the first time), signed in, and visited the same page. I selected the same 37 photos, pressed the tick button, and the page refreshed with the message: “Failed to load, please try again.”
It seems to me that the issue isn’t with my browsers, but with Google Reviews itself. What I don’t understand is why I’m the only one experiencing this problem.
I guess I may have to try doing this from my PC, but that means I would have to find ways to get my PC to have access to these photos first. It’s such a hassle. I’m not even sure if it will definitely work too. Sigh. Unless there’s something wrong with my account.
I don’t know, how many of us use a browser on the iPhone. I would guess, most use the Maps app on mobile (did you try that?) and others, like myself, a browser under Windows. Besides that, I always upload from my PC and never from Google Photos.
You can download individual photos or a all photos of a single album from Google Photos to your PC. However, for posting videos, this can only be done directly from Google Photos.
There also recommendations to limit the number of photos posted to a single place. Many local guides only post one or two. Personally, I don’t do more than 10, which did work two days ago, but uploading form PC directly to the listing.
As I said above, I always post directly to the listing and never attach to a review. Until about a year ago, you could upload many photos at once, but since a certain date, the limitation is 10. If you try to upload more than 10, you get an error message. Possibly, for attaching photos to a review, they also implemented some limitation, just the error message does come up …? Only a guess …
Just an update: I managed to submit a review via the web from my PC just now - all 37 photos in one go. But it was a hassle. I had to upload the photos from my phone to OneDrive first, and then drag them over to upload in the review.
I’m going to try submitting another review from my phone later. Maybe what I’ve been experiencing in the Chrome/Safari mobile apps is just a glitch with Google Reviews.
Thank you for the feedback, @rekrap. So very likely this happens only when using a browser instead of the Maps app on an iPhone.
To be honest, I never heard of any other local guide using the browser on the mobile phone to upload photos. Good, you found a solution. Personally, I limit myself to upload not more than 10 photos at once to the same place.
I usually use the mobile app for all my uploading @WilfriedB, but I did experiment with one single photo last week via my mobile browser.
It would be unlikely I’d ever need to upload 20 or more photos at once @rekrap as I don’t take that many at one place. Also, I mainly upload directly to the POI, rather than with the review.
It’s probably not a big issue if my photos are taken within the last few days. The problem is I have had some delayed reviews.