Automatic processing

When your family has automatic processing turned on, the app quietly does its AI work in the background. You just use the book — add photos, import a document, record a memory — and captions, people, faces, and dates fill themselves in a little while later. When someone in a new photo is already known to the book, their face is recognized and named automatically; brand-new faces are grouped together and suggested names appear once a few photos of the same person have arrived. There’s nothing to press.

What you’ll see

A small status chip sits next to the book title at the top:

• “Processing 12 pages…” — the app is working through new or changed pages right now.
• “All caught up” — nothing is waiting.

A page that’s still being worked on shows a gentle “Processing this page…” shimmer where its caption will appear. It will fill in on its own — you can keep browsing while it does.

When it pauses for the month

Each family has a monthly limit on AI usage. If you reach it, automatic processing pauses and a calm banner explains why. Nothing is lost — anything you upload is saved, and it will finish processing on its own when the limit resets at the start of next month. An admin can also raise the limit sooner.

Pages that need a second look

Occasionally a page can’t finish on its own — for example it ran up an unusually high cost and was paused for review, or a step didn’t succeed. The chip will note how many pages need review. These wait for an admin to take a quick look; they aren’t errors you need to fix.

Your edits always win

If you (or an admin) write or edit a caption yourself, automatic processing never overwrites it. Your words stay exactly as you wrote them, even if the photo is later cropped or improved.

Turning it on

Automatic processing is switched on for a whole family by a site administrator — there’s nothing individual members need to set up. If your family doesn’t have it on, an admin can still run the AI steps manually from the pipeline page.