The Google Pixel photo bug could ruin your holiday photos — before you even notice

Published On: December 24, 2025

A strange new Pixel bug

A strange new Pixel bug might have you wishing you hadn’t used one to capture your holiday photos. Losing your precious memories is every smartphone user’s worst nightmare, and some Pixel owners are now seeing photos vanish from the Google Photos timeline.

Your Pixel camera might be having a bit of a crisis because photos are not appearing in local storage and not backing up to the cloud. Instead, users are finding phantom files that never actually materialize, and that is leaving people scrambling for answers.

The vanishing act in your gallery

If you’ve been snapping away on your Pixel, you might want to double-check your gallery. A new report highlights a frustrating bug where photos taken on recent Google devices aren’t saved in the DCIM folder and never fully show up.

This is happening even when the phone shows pending files with zero bytes and constant notifications saying photos are processing in the background. The phone thinks it’s doing the work, but the data just doesn’t land.

Symptoms and affected devices

The “pending” glitch shows up in the DCIM folder, and users see zero-byte files with nothing inside. At the same time, a processing notification stays on the screen and never finishes in the background.

Reports mention the Pixel 10 Pro, Pixel 10, the Pixel 9 series, Pixel 9a, and the 8a. It often happens after taking several photos in a very short time span, turning the gallery into a confusing situation.

This is a major headache

This is a major headache because the Pixel identity is about having one of the best cameras that can fit in your pocket. Bugs exist on every phone, but this is a big one when you think about what is at stake.

Parents, travelers, and everyday users need to know that when they press that shutter, the memory is safe. You rarely hear about an iPhone simply failing to write a photo file after the click, and that comparison makes this feel even worse.

This feels a little half-baked

This feels a little half-baked and gives people pause before recommending the latest Pixel. It doesn’t happen to everyone, but the fact that it hits Pixel 10 Pro users suggests a deeper issue with the image processing pipeline.

If you see photos stuck processing, slow down between shots and keep an eye on notifications. Until Google pushes a fix, using these devices feels like a bit of a gamble.