Why photos appear in a different order

In short: the Photos app sorts pictures by the date they were taken, not by when you saved them. Look for your photos at the date of the shoot.

How it works

Your photographer usually keeps the gallery’s order in the files you download: each photo is dated the day of the shoot, in the gallery’s order. So in the Photos app — on iPhone, Android or a computer — the photos line up in the same order as in the gallery, and they sit at the shoot date, not at today.

In a ZIP archive the file names also start with a number (001, 002…), so sorting by name gives the gallery’s order too.

Can’t find the photos

Scroll back to the shoot date in the Photos app. A wedding shot in June shows up in June, even if you saved it today.
On iPhone, check that saving actually finished: see Save photos to iPhone.
Downloaded a ZIP on a phone? Archives go to the Files app or Downloads, not to Photos.

The order is still mixed up

Your photographer may have switched off keeping the gallery’s order. Then the Photos app uses the time from the photographer’s camera (photos from two cameras may interleave) or, for the phone size, the time you saved them. If the order matters to you, ask your photographer.

You can always check a photo’s place by its number (No. 12) in the gallery.