Lightroom Classic Face Recognition Issue: Only ~100 Faces Named on Auto Import, Others Show "?"
Product: Adobe Lightroom Classic
Version:14.4
Operating System: macOS Sequoia]
Catalog Size: [Insert approximate catalog size, e.g., 56,000 photos]
System Specs: [Macbook Pro M1 Ulta 64gb Ram]
Library Size: Approx 50k photos
Issue Description:
Every time I import photos into Adobe Lightroom Classic (onto my Macbook Pr M1 interal SSD), the face recognition feature consistently names only approximately 100 faces correctly, while all other detected faces are assigned a question mark (?). This occurs regardless of the number of photos imported (e.g., 100, 500, or 1000) or the clarity of the images. All faces are correctly detected as face regions during import, but only ~100 receive the correct names, even for individuals who are already tagged and recognized in other photos within the catalog.
I have Automatically Detect Faces In All Photos enabled in Catalog Settings > Metadata. However, no matter how long I wait after import (hours or even days), the remaining faces with question marks are not assigned names, and there is no visible background process (e.g., in the Activity Center) indicating that face recognition is still running. This suggests the naming process stops prematurely during or after import.
When I manually select all imported photos in the Library module and run Library > Find Faces Again (with both options unchecked: Skip Over Photos That Have Not Been Previously Indexed and Skip Photos With Confirmed or Manually Drawn Face Regions), Lightroom re-scans the faces and correctly assigns names to all faces, regardless of the number of photos. The re-scan takes approximately the same amount of time as the initial face detection during import, indicating no significant performance difference. This manual step consistently resolves the issue, but it’s inconvenient to perform after every import. I have been suffering this issue for as long as I can remember, maybe 18 months but hard to be sure.
After several updates have failed to address my problem I thought it was time to write for some help.
Does anyone have an idea what is causing this problem and has a potential solution?
Thanks in advance for any and all assistance!
