Frequently Asked Questions

When you scan old printed photos and add them to a photo library like Google Photos or Apple Photos, the library thinks the photo was taken on the day it was scanned. All your scanned photos end up clumped together at one date, out of place in your timeline.

Timeline Scan fixes this: you upload your scanned photos, and we use all the information given to give a best estimate for the original date of each photo. We take in the handwriting on the back, the filename, timestamps, nearby photos, and facial data to best estimate the photo's original date. When you import the corrected photos into your library, they appear in the right place in time.

Our AI examines many visual clues in the front of each photo: the style of clothing people are wearing, hairstyles, vehicles, home decor, the quality and type of the photograph itself (color vs. black-and-white, film grain, print borders), and other contextual details.

It also reads the back of each photo. Many old photos have handwritten notes like dates, names, locations, or descriptions. Our AI not only reads this handwriting and uses it to improve the date estimate, but also updates the photo's metadata that will appear in your photo library.

While no system can pinpoint the exact day a 20-year-old photo was taken, our AI is very good at determining the approximate year or era. The goal is to get your photos in the right part of your timeline, not mixed in with last week's pictures.

Timeline Scan works with any photo library or app that reads standard photo metadata. This includes:

Google Photos, Apple Photos (iCloud), Amazon Photos, Microsoft OneDrive, Immich, Flickr, and most other photo management apps.

We update the industry-standard EXIF & IPTC for date fields and ImageDescription, XMP, & IPTC fields for found handwriting. Any app that reads these fields will place your photos correctly and display the descriptions.

We only update the date and description information stored in the photo's metadta, not the image itself. Your photo's picture quality, resolution, and content remain completely untouched. Think of it like reading the note on the back of a printed photo and filing it in the right spot in your album. The picture doesn't change, you're just organizing it properly.

Absolutely. Your photos are processed securely and we do not keep copies after processing is complete. We don't sell, share, or use your photos for any other purpose. Your family memories are exactly that, yours. Photos are encrypted and processed by AI on enterprise-grade servers. Your photos are never used for training or for any other purpose. Once the AI has seen and has understood where your photo should be in time, the photo data is removed from the server.

We support JPEG, PNG, and TIFF files. We've found these are the most common formats that scanners produce.

If your scanner outputs a different format, most scanning software will let you choose to save as JPEG, which works perfectly. TIFF should be used as it's lossless and will retain the highest quaility for your scans.

That's perfectly fine. Many old photos have blank backs. Our AI will still analyze the front of the image to determine the date. The handwriting reading is a bonus.

Just scan the front and back of each photo one after the other, so they stay in order. For example: photo1-front, photo1-back, photo2-front, photo2-back, and so on. Most scanners will name the files sequentially, which keeps them paired automatically. We'll match them up from there. Simply tell us your naming convention and we'll automatically pair them up for you. Multiple naming conventions can be listed.

For scanner settings, file format, and naming recommendations, see our Scanning Best Practices below.

Our AI typically determines the correct decade and often narrows it down to within a few years. For example, a photo from 1982 might be dated to 1980 or 1983. The important thing is that it ends up near 1982 in your timeline rather than showing up in 2024 when you scanned it.

A few things you can do to improve accuracy:

• Always scan the back. Handwritten dates are the most reliable signal we have. A note that says “Christmas 1978” will always beat a visual estimate.
• Name files by album or box label. If a box is labeled “Jul89 – Sept90,” that time window helps us anchor photos that have no other date information.
• Set your scanner to always scan the back, not just when text is detected — light timestamps and faint pencil notes are easy to miss but our AI can read them.

If you know the exact dates of certain photos, you're always free to manually adjust them after importing. See our Scanning Best Practices for full details.

Most orders are processed within 24 to 48 hours. Larger collections (5,000+ photos) may take a bit longer. We'll email you when your photos are processed and ready to download.

We want you to be happy with the results. If the dating doesn't meet your expectations, reach out to us and we'll work with you to make it right at support@timelinescan.com. Your satisfaction and your family memories matter to us.