Apple Photos, iCloud, Sync and Family Access Questions

[MitzEclipse]

Hi all,

I have a Macbook Pro (2016 Catalina), iPhone 11 (iOS 14) and Apple TV4 (latest) and have question about Apple Photos sync. I am using Apple Photos on the Macbook, but currently do not have access to all of them on the iPhone. I want to start using iCloud for all of my photos but I have a few questions how this works:

- I have 200+gb Apple Photos library, how long would this take approx to upload to iCloud? obvious depends on internet speeds - my braodband is decently fast at 85mbps upload. Can the Macbook be in sleep mode or needs to be left on?

- I have 100gb left on my MacBook. When I start reaching maximum disc space, how does iCloud treat the photos? Does it automatically delete what's on the HD if it's in the iCloud? What if I have a 1TB Apple Photos library but only a 500gb laptop - how would Apple Photos work through this?

- When the photos upload, are photos uploaded in full high resolution? Or is the quality somehow cropped?

- How do photo albums work? if I create a photo album on the Mac, it will automatically appear on the iPhone and Apple TV?

- Is there a way to only view certain albums or years of photos on the Apple TV?

- What about videos, do these get uploaded to iCloud like photos without any issues?

- I've let my Mac do a lot of curation on Memories, People, etc. Does this transfer over to the iPhone/Apple TV as well?

- If, in the future, I decide to exit the Apple ecosystem, is it easy to download all of my Apple Photos to a local HD?

- Is there a way to link a folder to another family account/ iCloud/apple user so s/he can get access to a folder that grows every time I add photos to it? (and they get a notification?). Would these photos be high resolution?

Thanks in advance

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

That's a lot of questions. Here's answers to most of them. Apple support is another good source of the how and why things work.

1. Upload time will vary, but I do believe your machine will just upload as the system is awake. I find it to be pretty fast for me, but I'm on a 500/500 connection.
2. If you let iCloud manage your Photo Library and select Optimize Mac Storage, the full resolution photos are stored in iCloud, while lower-res versions are stored locally to save space. If you open an image and zoom, the full-res shot is downloaded automatically. Full-res shots are stored in iCloud. This is how you can access your full library that is larger than your Mac's storage. It just leverages the cloud to store full versions of your lesser accessed photos and videos. Like all things cloud, it is dependent on a network connection to get the most of this functionality.
3. Albums sync across your library, so all devices where you are signed in to iCloud photos will see the same things, this includes any edits you've done (edits are lossless). I believe tags and faces and the like also transfer across. I believe Apple's higher privacy standards try to limit what goes from your device to the cloud and back, so I might be wrong on that one. I believe all AI recognition work takes place on-device (unlike Google).
4. Videos also upload to iCloud and work the same way. This is one of the quickest ways to save local storage, since videos are so much larger. Same rule applies, when you try to access the video, it will download the original if it's been optimized off your local storage.
5. You can export "Unedited Originals" from Photos to get your library back. This will take a really long time for a large library.
6. I believe you have to create a shared library and then add content for others to see it. They will get notifications every time you add new content. It is a simple as dragging what you want to the shared album, but I don't believe you can automate this entirely.

 

[MitzEclipse]

Many thanks Darmok very informative. So to get started, all I have to do is tick the "photos" app in System Preferences -> Apple ID?

Is there a way to control how big the Photos Library is when I Optimize Mac Storage? for example, keep up to 50gb local then the rest pull from cloud?

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

No, you can’t. It’s an all-or-nothing affair when it comes to what is synced. I’m not entirely certain how you begin, as I’ve been using Photos and iCloud for years now. I believe you just enable iCloud Photos and let it go to work. I don’t know how it would handle 2 different libraries on 2 different devices. I would guess that it will combine them into one library, but I’m not sure.

 

[MitzEclipse]

Thanks for the info.
When I take a photo on the iPhone and it syncs to iCloud then back down to my Mac, is it FULL resolution? I just want to keep the original quality just like I get when I do a cable transfer. Thanks

 

[r.harris1]

Thanks for the info.
When I take a photo on the iPhone and it syncs to iCloud then back down to my Mac, is it FULL resolution? I just want to keep the original quality just like I get when I do a cable transfer. Thanks

In Photos->Preferences->iCloud->iCloud Photos->Optimize Mac Storage is enabled, the original resolution images are stored in iCloud and not on your local device (Mac). You can grab those images anytime you want, for example when editing in Photos. If, on the other hand, you enable "Download originals to this Mac", then all of your images at full resolution will be downloaded locally. Depends on how you want to use them and how much space you have locally (vs the space your images consume) as to which of those options make the most sense for you.

 

[MitzEclipse]

Thank you for clearing that up - great to know that option exists. Thank you all