Lightroom Classic: Ability to sync Smart Collections with (Lightroom CC / Mobile / lightroom.adobe.com)

Completely agree! Come on Lightroom!!!

Yes indeed - I am waiting for this feature too!

Me too. Would make using Instagram easier by getting desired photos to my smartphone.

I also would LOVE this feature

This would be a super feature. I know it would be really good to be able to sync a smart folder with images from the last 7 days, so that they can be retrieved easily. Most of the work on an image, in my case, will be done in the first few days.

This woukd be so much easier, showing clients new photos on the ipad that get collected automatically. Please!

This feature would be so helpful!

Yes, please add. The fact it isn't possible seems like a random decision.

I agree.  I have installed Lightroom Mobile, but I don't use it because of the limitation of not using Smart Collections.  It means an extra step for me to add my selected photos to my collections.  I'd like to be able to have a keyword like "Lightroom Mobile" and have any image with this keyword or a combination of that and another one populate a collection so I can easily maintain my sync'd collections by simply adding or removing the keyword while working on images in my catalog.  Seems like a flaw in the designer's thinking to not have this, and to not express why it isn't included for some technical (?) reason.

Synched Smart Collections would make my life so much easier.
If there is a technical difficulty then please explain it to us. And if it is feasible please tell us when we will see it happen.

This feature request is so very fundamental to the workflow of Lightroom.

By not syncing smart collections, LR Mobile is a cart without a horse. The mobile app is useless because I don't know which photos to be editing until I have access to the smart collections that house the photos that need to be edited.

I concur on this. Also, my tablet is neither iOS or Android. It is a Surface 3. So I would like to be able to sync two catalogues under full-function Lightroom CC: one on a desktop system and one on the Surface 3.

Not  much that I can add other than this would be an extremely valuable capability.  It is perplexing that is not available.

There are a number of technical problems to syncing smart collections. For example: right now you can add an image to a collection in Lightroom Mobile. It will then sync to the corresponding collection in Lightroom Desktop. But if the collection in Lightroom Desktop is a smart collection, you can't manually add images to it; images are added based on criteria. So syncing a smart collection from Lightroom Desktop would require a change in the collections in Lightroom Mobile too: those collections would have to become 'read only' so you can't add or remove images from them.

Another problem could be if you change some aspect of an image in Lightroom Mobile (like the rating), causing the image to no longer fit the criteria of the smart collection in Lightroom Desktop. What would/should happen in this case? Should the image disappear from the LrM collection immediately? That would require a search capability in LrM (making the collection smart in LrM too) that isn't present right now. In case of a 'read only' collection, the image would remain until sync is done (which can be a long time if one of the two is offline), and then it would suddenly disappear after all. And don't forget: a 'read only' collection does not stop you from changing the rating of an image, because an image can be in more than one collection. You could change the rating of an image in another (normal) collection, only to find that it has mysteriously disappeared from the synched smart collection after some time.

So yes, I would like to see this too, but I do understand that the implementation is not as easy as it may sound.

Add my vote .. yes please!

While I certainly understand the possible issues with syncing smart catalogues I take exception to the scenario where an images changes on mobile so gets removed from the smart collection on CC. My answer is so what? Perhaps a warning could be presented that making changes to an image smart collection criteria "might cause the image to be removed from the collection". Doesn't the same thing happen in CC? without warning?

Has there been any current movement in Adobe to allow syncing Smart Collections to Lightroom mobile?   I'm stunned that this have been hanging for 3 years and has not been added.   I keep getting the "would you recommend Lightroom to a friend......?"  survey.   My once full positive moves one start to the left overtime I see it now.   Adobe should get off its duff and get moving on Lightroom as other options are quickly coming available.

Anyway, add my "yes" to the vote tally.   And I agree with Geg Jr.  The scenarios are ridiculous - if you manage your smart collections on your desk top or lap top, and the criteria for being included in a smart collection changes, then it should be removed across the networks.   Goodness, let people manage themselves.

Add my YES vote!  I can't believe it doesn't already do this!

For me it is a must have as well. If we can have it for the desktop version only, it would be OK for me. For instance if I want to filter on what is not in an Album to find some lost photos; it is simply not possible. I need it to organize my photos and I can do that when I have my desktop available. It is not required for iPad. Apple Photos has it. For Lr should be better than this, otherwise what is the point of having the app?

Add my YES vote!!  Please.  Just doesn't make sense otherwise!

I’m paying extra for SmugMug right now because they allow this. Shouldn’t have to do that!

Add my vote

I agree, this is the feature searched when I started to use the mobile app, please it's close to Xmas

Totally agree... this would be a really useful update.

Adobe hit a big foul ball on this one.  It's is like a telephone that doesn't let you dial the last digit - so close but without it, the whole thing is just plain useless.  Like Randy, I'm also paying for SmugMug to get a solution that should be Adobe > Adobe. 

C'mon guys, let's get this sorted out.

Not having Smart Collections in LR CC is a huge step backwards. How on Earth did Adobe decide this functionality was not worthy of inclusion from day one of CC? Please ge this fixed as a priority!

Smart collections are far more useful than regular ones. I agree this should have been on Lr CC from day one.

Why is this still not resolved? Is anyone at Adobe reading this? It seems not that complicated to fix and would be very useful functionality to the Lightroom ecosystem

Totally agree.  Wrong or right, my photos are separated by smart collections in my catalog.  Thus it would be very beneficial to sync smart collections. Why doesn't adobe Lightroom include this feature?  The lack of smart collections not syncing is very frustrating.  

Well Tom, I think you got enough replies. I just enabled mobile and ONLY have smart collections so am having to make some dumb ones to try this out. My .02, if the filter criteria is changed from the mobile app then Undo should be available for 7 days.

How about instead of trying to undo or review just have option of turning off certain mobile features based on collections or all collections. For example turning off the option to change flags or rating on a collection. I personally don't use the flag option on mobile as I do all that work on my PC, however I find I occasionally change the flag myself or showing someone photos on my mobile device they change the flags by accident too when flicking through photos.

Just an idea.

This would add so much value on the mobile app

Mark

I think 30 mins is more than enough time to realize your mistake.

A lock flagging option for a collection would be nice regardless just to prevent accidental flagging when thumbing through picks or letting a client browse

I can see where that might be an issue with smart collections, I was wondering how about the option to have images put into collections as they are being imported or tethered to a computer that way they can be views on LR mobile on the iPad by a client or photo assist as you are shooting in the studio, this way, especially in the case of a client, they can like and reject images right then and there without having to walk all the way over to the computer.

I'm afraid I don't understand what could be taking so long to implement smart collections. With a large base of users begging for this feature for over 6 months, I would have thought Adobe would pull the trigger on it by now. This feature is so fundamental that I consider lightroom mobile to be useless, meaning that I also believe I've been wasting at least part of my monthly payments to Adobe. When oh when will this be fixed?!?!?

^ totally agree.

It's enough with 'most recent undo'.

Lr user since first beta, i just discover Lr mobile, and first surprise (and disappointment) is that i can't syncronize a smart collection... Most recent undo would be enough, i agree. Thanks for the great work. :)

Looks like it's been a while since this was initially requested.  Any progress to report?

Give the data that can be stored in a database, there is no reason why smart collections can't be sync'ed with LR Mobile. A simple introduction of a table storing actions would suffice. However, the ability to sync smart collections and the benefits it would bring (sorting/rating/flagging - on the move) far out-ways the inability to 'undo' an action on a desktop device.

I do find it limiting that Adobe have chosen not to implement the ability to sync a smart collection, and can see no sensible reason why not (I'm a DBA so used to working with database systems - and this would easily be achievable if Adobe 'wanted to').

Regarding the point made by Tom Hogarty, if a user amended the pick status and that amendment would remove the photo(s) from Lightroom mobile , surely a dialogue box informing the user would be sufficient?

/necromancy

One approach would be that the mobile version of a smart collection is relatively dumb, only having its contents updated by the full desktop application. Admittedly, this would not cater to all use cases. Nonetheless, it seems to me that it would be pretty useful, and technically and conceptually clear.

I want to use LR Mobile for not to Edit the pictures, but to quickly import the selected edited picture from LR Desktop.

As we can't sync Smart Albums to LRM, It is unusable to me. So, I am using Flickr services where we can publish smart albums. 

If something changed (like unflag), It gives a popup as "These pics will be removed from Album". I have no issues with that.

I find myself doing what Bhanu does.  My Flickr Pro account is what I use and will use until Adobe allows Smart collections to sync with LR mobile.  With in excess of 50000 photos in Lightroom, I obviously don't want to sync all of them.  However, after post editing following a shoot, it would be really nice for the chosen edited photos to sync automatically with LR mobile.  I find it disappointing that we can't do this yet as the combination of smart collections and sync with mobile were the primary reason for me purchasing LR CC.  I understand that there are a few complications, but I would think that Adobe has access to the best of the best database technicians and they could certainly and easily figure out a way to make this work seamlessly.

How about just a warning that the file will be removed from the collection if that change is applied? Then if I say yes, it's what I meant to do and I can live with it.

Any change in the source should be reflected in the sync result. 
(no warning needed).

If the image is in the collection by virtue of a flag then if the flag is removed the image no longer fits the criteria so thus, it must be removed. Seems simple to me. Doesn't CC remove an image from a smart collection if the image no longer fits the criteria? Am I missing something here?

Hey Tom ,

Will this feature ever be added?

Doubt it

Strongly believe that this functionality is critical and should have been part of first release.

C'mon Tom let's get this added!

wow three years ago this topic and it's not resolve yet! We need smart collections. I think a work around would be that all images  that are sync stay for some time  in the (all sync images) even if you change the condition that made that particular image to be in a smartcollection. So if you are working on the mobile version and un unpick the flag, the fotos is not any more in the smart collection, but this is not directly inked to the sync. then in the configuration one could choose for how long keep sync images that are not in a specific collection(orphan fotos lets say) these would exist only in a global all sync photos, but not inside any smart or normal synced collection.

this is a big bummer. I am just digging in deep with LRC and loving it but I need to ulpad smart collections to the cloud!

I don't know about you but my whole library is far too large for a mobile device.

As for a pop-up warning, I agree with a previous comment that it would be exceptionally annoying, but if it can be turned off that's a reasonable compromise.

If you know of a 4TB Ipad. Let me know

There are alternatives to actually synching the entire smart collect if the collection is really large... as long as you are on Wifi you could cache small thumbs for the grid view and pull down larger versions for loupe view or editing. There are usually creative ways to handle things we just have to take things less literally.