Apple Photos 3: The changes, new features, and improvements you should know about

Photos 3, part of macOS High Sierra, doesn’t bring much that’s truly new. Apple acknowledges this by listing changes as a combination of improvements and enhancements, a welcome bit of frankness. And I’d argue it’s great news, because many of the rough spots in the Sierra release that we heard about repeatedly from readers who ran afoul of them have been smoothed down.

But Photos has come a long way since its first release in April 2015. That initial foray at replacing iPhoto with something fresher, faster, and better often fell short, because it was missing many features that people relied on with iPhoto. Apple released regular updates, however, and features returned, new ones appeared, and existing ones matured. Some people still hate it—I get emails—but it settled down for the most part.

For example, those who have emailed me asking how to force an alphabetical listing of albums in the Photos sidebar will be absolutely delighted. The sidebar now organizes albums into Media Types (things like Slo-Mo, Selfies, and the like) and My Albums, which comprises everything you’ve created. You can nest folders in My Albums as before. Right-click on My Albums, and you can choose Sort By, and select among name, oldest first, or newest first. Bonus: Any of those nested folders you create to organize