Why did Apple remove “select all” for photos in iOS 18?

[delsoul]

I usually like to transfer the photos off of my phone by using an external SD card connected to the charging port. With iOS 18, I’ve noticed they removed the “select all”
Option that used to be there. It was super easy to transfer pictures, just check the select all box and then transfer. Now? Have to select each one manually. It’s a real PITA. Is this apples bs way of forcing people to use Cloud because then users don’t have to go through selecting all the pictures and transferring them?

 

[Nermal]

Is this apples bs way of forcing people to use Cloud

If it was an isolated incident then I'd think you were overreacting, but combined with corrupting the timestamps I suspect you might be right...

 

[arw]

Not a solution but a workaround (that I'm using) is the paid app FileBrowser.
Only difference is, I copy them onto a remote network share.
There is also FileBrowser Professional which supports actual syncing of folders (which I have no experience with).

If by "select each one manually" you actually mean picture by picture, have you tried this on iOS 18 (I can only test on iOS 17):

Open Photos and choose "Select". Now, just slide your finger left to right across the images of choice, and a blue checkmark will appear on each selected photo. If you want, after sliding sideways to initiate the gesture, you can then slide up or down to continuously select images while scrolling.

The Fastest Way to Select Multiple Photos on Your iPhone

Whether it's to delete a few photos or share a bunch with another app, there are times when you need to select several pictures at once. This would usually be annoying since you'd have to tap every picture you wanted to select, but there's a much faster way to batch select. Open Photos and...

ios.gadgethacks.com

 

[jzuena]

The Fastest Way to Select Multiple Photos on Your iPhone

Whether it's to delete a few photos or share a bunch with another app, there are times when you need to select several pictures at once. This would usually be annoying since you'd have to tap every picture you wanted to select, but there's a much faster way to batch select. Open Photos and...

ios.gadgethacks.com

This does still work in iOS 18, although it was a little finicky on my iPad. It took a couple tries to get all of the photos selected.