OneDrive changing the dates on my photos?!?!?

TFlip, you are mistaken about the technical aspects of this:

1. All Windows folders set the "Date modified" to be the date the file was added to the folder. That's been that way since before Windows, back in DOS days. It would not be rational to change this for pictures, especially given that there's already a separate field for this that works perfectly called "Date taken"
2. In the current version of Windows 10 (I'm on 1903, not sure how long it has worked this way), for a folder showing Images (every folder has a primary content type of General Items, Documents, Images, Music, or Videos), it is smart enough to actually use the "Date taken" and NOT the "Date modified" (I don't think this was true when this thread started. See the screen capture here, note how the "Date" field (the one Windows shows by default) equals the "Date taken" field and NOT the "Date modified" field. I manually added those 2 columns to the view.

3. To your point that it's only one file at a time that you can access the "Date taken" field, that is also incorrect. As you can see in the screen capture above, I was able to show the "Date taken" field in Explorer. Just set the View to Details, then right click on the header row and add the "Date taken" option. Then it will appear for all files in that folder Explorer. If you want all folders to use this view (probably not for pictures, because Large or Extra Large icons is better for browsing, but if you're troubleshooting dates, this could come in handy as a temporary view for all picture folders), you can go to View -> Options -> View tab -> Apply to Folders to get all folders with pictures to use this view. 

Hope that helps.

This really needs to be fixed... here here

Quite amazing to see the obfuscation and confusion going on in tech replies around this major problem. It is not about the 'date taken' metadata in the photo files. Most people are using, for all files where date matters, the simple file created/last modified data that is apparent on any file manager. Onedrive appears to alter that simply by the act of uploading the file to the cloud, ie. if you upload ten files today they will all have today's date and time of uploading.

If you are trying to use onedrive as an archive, or to mirror between computers for instance, it will not work for you. For example, if you just want to see the most recent files, as you deliberately modified or created them, you will not be able to if they have gone to Onedrive.

The original dates will probably still be there in the metadata if you open the file, eg. if I open a pdf, showing in file explorer properties the date it went to Onedrive,  it will still have the real date created and real last modified inside it when I open properties in the pdf reader. However, this is clearly impractical if I am trying to quickly sort or access multiple files. I would have to open each one in turn and go through that process of opening and inspecting properties to find their chronological order.

In short because Onedrive works this way it really is only useful as a replacement for your computer or network hard drive.  If date matters, then you must always work on Onedrive, so it is the true representation of when a file was last worked on. In the case of photos you will need to upload as soon as possible from when you take them, that way they will show an approximate date. This is of course an absurd situation.

Can see how this approach makes business sense for Microsoft but for anyone who wants to not be held hostage, the message is stay away. While in its current state, do not use Onedrive for back-up if dates matter. Given the tech replies there is obviously no fix available. Dropbox or perhaps icloud will be a better solution for people who want to back-up and archive.

Today I thought I was having the same problem.  I am using the OneDrive website from an Android phone. I verified OneDrive is NOT changing Date Taken field. 

However, in the Photos section, it is showing old photos I just uploaded using the Date Created field instead of Date Taken.... Let me explain. 

I saved some photos from March 31st that someone sent me. Their Date Taken field is correct  On my phone, the Date Created field says today, which is correct since I just downloaded them. 

So when I upload them, the Photos section shows them under May (Date Created) instead of March (Date Taken). 

This really needs to be fixed. 

EDIT: Even stranger, OneDrive updates Date Created to be the time I uploaded it, making its Date Created greater than its Date Modified. I also can't even find the Date Taken field (at least on the mobile site). I have to download it first and then I can see that Date Taken is still correct.

Hi piscov,

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