How to Move Photos From iCloud to Google Photos
If you love taking a lot of photos or videos with your iPhone, you may be running out of space. You can back up to iCloud, but with only 5GB of free space, you can run out pretty quickly. This leaves you with a few options, the most obvious being deleting files or updating your iCloud subscription.
If you have a Google account, you can use the free Google Photos storage as an alternative. This gives you unlimited storage for photos and videos if you allow Google to compress your content first. Here’s what you need to do if you want to know how to transfer photos from iCloud to Google Photos
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Before you begin
While Google Photos is a great option for users who need to back up their iPhone photos, there are some limitations you need to be aware of before you start moving photos from iCloud to Google Photos
First, as we mentioned, Google Photos offers unlimited storage with anchored strings. If the image resolution of your photos exceeds 16 megapixels, Google Photos will automatically lower the quality. Likewise, videos above 1080p will be scaled down to the maximum 1080p.
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If you don’t want to compress multimedia content, reducing quality in the process, you can set up Google Photos backups to use your default Google Account storage. Free Google account holders have 15GB of storage, but you can add more if you need more.
If you use iCloud across multiple platforms, you might prefer a service that doesn’t keep you locked up. iCloud is the service best for Apple users, and you may prefer to store your photos in Google Photos so you can easily access them on Windows and Android devices as well.
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How to Transfer Photos from iCloud to Google Photos on iOS
If you want to move photos from iCloud to Google Photos on iPhone, you need to install the Google Photos app and sign in first. This allows you to automatically back up all photos and videos on your device, similar to how iCloud backs up your media to iCloud when you create a new photo or video.
If iCloud syncs your photos, you can access them on your Apple device. This will allow other apps like Google Photos to access your iCloud Photo collection. Then you can sync your iCloud photos to Google Photos, freeing up iCloud storage for other content.
- First, make sure iCloud Photo Sync is currently enabled and Download and Keep Originals is enabled. To do this, open the device settings menu, tap your name at the top, then tap iCloud Photos. Make sure the iCloud Photos slider is enabled in the Photos menu — tap it if it’s not.
- If your iCloud photos are currently syncing with your device, open Google Photos, tap the menu icon in the upper left corner, then tap Settings.
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- From the Settings menu, choose Startup & Sync.
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- Tap the slider next to Backup & sync to turn on Google Photos sync.
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- With the slider enabled, tap the Download Size option. If you haven’t already, select High quality (free unlimited storage). This will compress your downloadable photos using unlimited photo storage.
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If Backup & Sync is enabled, Google Photos will start backing up your photo collection. Then, you can turn off iCloud Photo syncing in the settings area so that your photos stay synced only with Google Photos and not duplicated in your iCloud.
How to Transfer Photos from iCloud to Google Photos on Mac
To move photos from iCloud to Mac, you need to use the Google Backup and Sync app for macOS. Using a process similar to the one above, you can directly sync your iCloud Photo collection to Google Photos Then you can delete photos from iCloud to prevent duplication.
- To do this, you need to install the Google Backup and Sync app for macOS. After installing the software, log into your Google account.
- After entering the Startup and Sync application, it will ask you which folders you want to sync. By default, your photo library (in your Pictures folder) should be set to sync, so you don’t need to change it. This is your iCloud photo collection.
- In the Upload Photos and Videos Size section, select High Quality to store an unlimited number of photos (compressing photos in the process), or Original Quality to save photos at full resolution.
- Under Google Photos, select the Upload photos and videos to Google Photos check box. Once you have selected your settings, click Next to continue.
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- If you want to sync your Google Drive files with your Mac, confirm this in the last step by checking the “Sync my drive with this computer” checkbox, and then click Start to confirm.
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At this point, Google Backup and Sync will start syncing files between your Mac, Google Drive and Google Photo. Once the process is complete, you will be able to view your iCloud Photo collection on the Google Photos website and the Google Photos apps on iOS and Android.
After that, you should be able to turn off iCloud Photo Sync in System Preferences Apple ID iCloud menu. You should only disable this after making sure the Google Backup and Sync app has fully backed up your photo collection to prevent any inconsistencies.
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Alternate Image Storage Options
Moving photos and other content from iCloud to Google Photos is a good way to store your media without the extra cost of unlimited storage. The downside is compression: if you don’t want to degrade the quality of your photos, you may need to look for alternative ways to store your photos in the cloud.
Of course, Mac and iOS users will find that using iCloud is the best service for Apple users. You can upload files to iCloud from a PC, which allows Windows users to use iCloud storage. You can also access iCloud from Android devices, giving users full iCloud coverage on all mobile devices.
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