5 years of pics and videos on my IP 11, time to clean house - how?

[Damn Dirty Ape]

Ok I have pics and videos going back to 2015 on my IP 11 pro max (backups and restores on each iphone). Now I want to remove a lot of these and archive but each time I do so within a day they are back. I like the idea of them being in the 'cloud' but I want them to NOT be put back after archiving off-device.

I would however like them kept on the 'cloud' just not auto-replaced on my devices.


Apple support said 'no way to do that. Seriously? I have iExplorer which is handy but not helping a lot.

 

[Minorite]

Nothing you can do while they are still on the cloud. The only options are deleting them from the phone/synced Mac or moving to Google Photos.

 

[aakshey]

Nothing you can do while they are still on the cloud. The only options are deleting them from the phone/synced Mac or moving to Google Photos.

This.

 

[BigPaus]

Sorry - I am confused - are they on the device, or have you backed them up to the cloud? If the first, then I use Windows Photo manager. Works amazing, has the option to remove after transfer and doesn't duplicate. Has other features, but I usually bulk transfer everything off and then sort through manually.

 

[pika2000]

Ok I have pics and videos going back to 2015 on my IP 11 pro max (backups and restores on each iphone). Now I want to remove a lot of these and archive but each time I do so within a day they are back. I like the idea of them being in the 'cloud' but I want them to NOT be put back after archiving off-device.

I would however like them kept on the 'cloud' just not auto-replaced on my devices.


Apple support said 'no way to do that. Seriously? I have iExplorer which is handy but not helping a lot.

Are you using iCloud Photo Library? If yes, simply go to the settings and enable optimize iPhone storage. You won’t have to worry about space on your iPhone anymore as it will automatically delete photos from the phone as it needs storage space. You will still have all your photos in iCloud.