# Why can't I download photos? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 13, 2026, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-i-download-photos/1026653 "2026-01-13T19:07:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2026, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-i-download-photos/1026653/1 "2026-01-13T19:07:30Z")
Took a photo with my phone. Emailed it to myself. Saved it to downloads, supposedly, but I can’t upload it to the internet, because it only shows up as “unknown”, multiple times. Why is this happening, and what can I do about it? This has **never** happened before. ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2026, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-i-download-photos/1026653/2 "2026-01-13T19:32:27Z")
You seem to be adding in two unnecessary steps. Just upload it from the phone. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2026, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-i-download-photos/1026653/3 "2026-01-13T21:28:29Z")
Can you provide more specifics? What kind of phone, what kind of email service (that received the image), what was it saved as (jpg, heif, avif, webp, something else?), and where did you “upload it to the internet” to? As Eyebrows said, if you just go to an image hosting site like [https://imgur.com/](https://imgur.com/) straight from your phone, you should be able to upload the image directly without doing the intermediary email and download steps. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2026, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-i-download-photos/1026653/4 "2026-01-13T21:40:01Z")
It’s an iPhone 16. I was sending it to Outlook, with which I’ve never had this problem before. I right-clicked on Save to Downloads, as I’ve always done before, and it shows up in my photo archives as an unclickable “Unknown”. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2026, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-i-download-photos/1026653/5 "2026-01-13T21:41:18Z")
Are you saving the photo in heic format? ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2026, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-cant-i-download-photos/1026653/6 "2026-01-13T21:46:26Z")
When you say Outlook, do you mean the webmail service, or the desktop Outlook app on a Windows computer? Because if it’s a Windows computer, especially an older one, this is a very likely culprit: > [@beowulff](#): > > Are you saving the photo in heic format? Some iPhones in some configurations will save your photos in a newer Apple-designed image format. It’s a much better image format, but it’s also much less compatible, and some older Windows apps and computers won’t support it right. Your iPhone MAY have also saved a JPEG version alongside the HEIC, so be sure you’ve sent that instead of the HEIC version. Or you can turn it off altogether and always save as JPEG: [Article - Disabling HEIC on iOS Devices](https://servicedesk.nku.edu/TDClient/2436/Portal/KB/ArticleDet?ID=166103) As for why it’s always worked, did you recently change a photo setting? Get a new phone? Or an iOS update? * * * Edit: There’s an easy test. You can download sample HEIC images at [HEIC sample file gallery | Download HEIC images](https://heic.digital/samples/) (on the computer with Outlook) and see if they show up right. If not, you might need [HEIF Image Extension - Microsoft Apps](https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9pmmsr1cgpwg?hl=en-US&gl=US) and [HEVC Video Extensions - Download and install on Windows | Microsoft Store](https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9nmzlz57r3t7?hl=en-US&gl=US). You can also upload your image to a identifier service like [View Metadata](https://www.metadata2go.com/view-metadata) to see what format it’s actually in.