Import photos from an SD card to Photos on a Mac.
Updated September 28, 2026
The short answer: insert the card in your Mac’s SD card slot or a card reader, open Photos, click the card under Devices in the sidebar and import the photos you want. If you’d rather look at every photo properly and import only the best ones, use a culling app such as Vaska, which is free.
What you need
A Mac with an SD card slot, or a card reader for your type of card — SD, microSD or CFexpress. Most card readers connect with USB-C. When you insert the card, it appears in the Finder sidebar like any other disk, with your photos in a folder called DCIM.
Import with Photos
- Insert the card and open Photos.
- Click the card under Devices in the sidebar. Photos shows everything on the card and marks photos you’ve already imported.
- Choose an album to import into, if you like.
- Select the photos you want and click Import Selected, or click Import All New Photos.
Keep “Delete items after import” turned off until you know the photos are safely in your library and backed up.
Copy with Image Capture or the Finder
If you don’t use Photos, open Image Capture, select the card, choose a folder and download the photos — or simply drag the DCIM folder from the Finder. You get every file on the card, but no way to choose the best ones first.
Import only the best with Vaska
The import in Photos shows small thumbnails, so it’s easy to import everything and sort it out later — with blurry shots and near-duplicates taking up space in your library and in iCloud. Vaska turns it around: decide first, import after.
- Insert the card. Vaska shows the photos straight from the card. The first time, click Allow so that Vaska may read it.
- Go through the photos. Press P to keep a photo, X to reject it, 1–5 to rate it and Z to check the focus at 100%.
- Click Import. Choose a new album, an existing album or just your library. Only the photos you kept are imported, and RAW+JPEG pairs stay together.
- Eject the card. Nothing on the card has been changed.
Vaska is free on the Mac App Store and needs macOS 26 or later. Read more about Vaska.
Tips for a smooth import
- Check the focus at 100%. A photo can look sharp as a thumbnail and still be slightly out of focus.
- Import into an album per shoot or trip, so the photos are easy to find later.
- Don’t erase the card until your photos are backed up, for example with Time Machine or iCloud Photos.
- Shoot RAW+JPEG? Photos keeps each pair together as one photo, and you can choose later to use the RAW file as the original.
Questions and answers
Why doesn’t my SD card show up?
Check that the card is inserted all the way and whether it appears in the Finder sidebar. If it doesn’t appear there either, try another card reader or USB port.
Does importing delete the photos from the card?
Not unless you turn on “Delete items after import” in Photos. Vaska never deletes anything from the card.
Can I import only some of the photos?
Yes. In Photos, select the ones you want before you import. In Vaska, the photos you keep are the ones that are imported.
Where do the imported photos end up?
In your Photos library. If iCloud Photos is turned on, they’re uploaded to iCloud and appear on your other devices too.