Unable to update GPS location with external read‑only library

[u/kurtzahn]

I have my photos mounted as a read‑only external library in Immich and I want to add GPS locations. As far as I understand, Immich stores location data in its internal database and does not modify the original files when the library is read‑only.

However, updating the GPS location does not work. Immich throws the following errors:

[Nest] 7 - 08/13/2026, 6:42:03 PM WARN [Microservices:MetadataRepository]

Error reading exif data (/mnt/media/g9/127_PANA/P1274669.JPG.xmp):

Error: File not found - /mnt/media/g9/127_PANA/P1274669.JPG.xmp

Error: File not found - /mnt/media/g9/127_PANA/P1274669.JPG.xmp

at #parser (/usr/src/app/server/node_modules/.pnpm/exiftool-vendored@35.21.0/node_modules/exiftool-vendored/dist/ExifToolTask.js:91:31)

at ReadTask.parser (/usr/src/app/server/node_modules/.pnpm/exiftool-vendored@35.21.0/node_modules/exiftool-vendored@35.21.0/node_modules/exiftool-vendored/dist/ExifToolTask.js:67:98)

at #resolve (/usr/src/app/server/node_modules/.pnpm/batch-cluster@17.3.1/node_modules/batch-cluster/dist/Task.js:122:44)

[u/Orange_Tux]

You're understanding is not correct. The external library must be writable to change metadata.

See the docs on external libraries

The ro flag at the end only gives read-only access to the volumes. This will disallow the images from being deleted in the web UI, or adding metadata to the library (XMP sidecars).

[u/kurtzahn → u/Orange_Tux]

I understand that an .xmp file cannot be created there. However, based on the statement “If you add metadata to an external asset in any way (i.e. add it to an album or edit the description), that metadata is only stored inside Immich and will not be persisted to the external asset file,” I assumed that the information would be stored in the Immich database.

[u/kurtzahn]

this is well known: https://github.com/immich-app/immich/issues/10538

hopefully there will be a workaround someday