How do you know when Photos are uploaded to iCloud?

[Kendo]

I have 20GB worth of photos on my phone and I've been backing them up through the regular iCloud backup process. I just changed it to have them backed up in iCloud Photo Library to save space on my phone through the Optimize iPhone Storage option. But how do you tell when it is completed? There is no indication if it is being backed up or not.

Edit - Never mind. I now see a counter of the progress.

 

[gsmornot]

I have 20GB worth of photos on my phone and I've been backing them up through the regular iCloud backup process. I just changed it to have them backed up in iCloud Photo Library to save space on my phone through the Optimize iPhone Storage option. But how do you tell when it is completed? There is no indication if it is being backed up or not.

Edit - Never mind. I now see a counter of the progress.

FYI: If you're not low on storage at the moment, checking the optimize option will not (in most cases) reduce your space usage right away. The phone will wait until you need the space and as you do it will swap the fullsize photo with a thumbnail. When you click on a photo that has been optimized, your phone will download a medium size photo for better viewing. The fullsize will only download when you click edit or send the photo to someone.

If you would like to save space now, verify all photos have been uploaded by looking at the bottom of the Photos tab or looking in Settings-iCloud-Photos. Once you verify you can turn iCloud Photo Library off. You will delete the photos from your device but this will only remove the photos that are in a reduced format. Fullsize photos will need to be removed manually. Once done, clear your deleted photos folder. You will now have a phone with no photos. Turn the iCloud Photo Library option on again and set optimized as your preference. This will download thumbnail sized photos to your phone and in turn give you the difference in space. Any questions, let me know.

 

[Kendo]

FYI: If you're not low on storage at the moment, checking the optimize option will not (in most cases) reduce your space usage right away. The phone will wait until you need the space and as you do it will swap the fullsize photo with a thumbnail. When you click on a photo that has been optimized, your phone will download a medium size photo for better viewing. The fullsize will only download when you click edit or send the photo to someone.

If you would like to save space now, verify all photos have been uploaded by looking at the bottom of the Photos tab or looking in Settings-iCloud-Photos. Once you verify you can turn iCloud Photo Library off. You will delete the photos from your device but this will only remove the photos that are in a reduced format. Fullsize photos will need to be removed manually. Once done, clear your deleted photos folder. You will now have a phone with no photos. Turn the iCloud Photo Library option on again and set optimized as your preference. This will download thumbnail sized photos to your phone and in turn give you the difference in space. Any questions, let me know.

Wow that is really helpful. What if I wanted to delete a photo from the cloud? I was first thinking of a scenario where I didn't want to accidentally delete a photo from my phone which would make it delete from the cloud as well.

But what if I actually wanted to delete a photo from the cloud?

 

[gsmornot]

Wow that is really helpful. What if I wanted to delete a photo from the cloud? I was first thinking of a scenario where I didn't want to accidentally delete a photo from my phone which would make it delete from the cloud as well.

But what if I actually wanted to delete a photo from the cloud?

When you delete the phone from your device (iPad, iPhone, etc) it will delete from the cloud as well. (with iCloud Photo Library on). This will be the normal mode. If you delete a photo by mistake it will be in the delete photos folder for 30 days so you can go get it and restore it before its gone. The process outlined above is more of a one time, first time, space saving cleanup effort to get you started on the optimized setting. Day-to-day you will take photos, add photos and delete photos and the cloud will keep that in sync on your other devices and within the cloud.

 

[Kendo]

If you would like to save space now, verify all photos have been uploaded by looking at the bottom of the Photos tab or looking in Settings-iCloud-Photos. Once you verify you can turn iCloud Photo Library off.

What exactly am I looking at to verify all photos have been uploaded in the Photos tab? I don't see any prompt that says "all photos have are in iCloud or 954/954 photos have been uploaded" or anything like that.

 

[gsmornot]

What exactly am I looking at to verify all photos have been uploaded in the Photos tab? I don't see any prompt that says "all photos have are in iCloud or 954/954 photos have been uploaded" or anything like that.

In the Photos App, Photos tab, scroll to the bottom and look at the photo count. If you see # Photos, # Videos and Updated just now it done. If not done, you will see a number of photos left to upload.

 

[Kendo]

In the Photos App, Photos tab, scroll to the bottom and look at the photo count. If you see # Photos, # Videos and Updated just now it done. If not done, you will see a number of photos left to upload.

So I turned off iCloud Photo Library after finishing the upload and was going to delete all my photos stored on the phone but then I forgot something so I went back to iCloud Photo Library and turned it back on. Now it is starting the upload process all over again (literally uploaded 500MB of 19GB for the past few minutes). Is this normal? Just by turning off and turning on iCloud Photo Library, it will overwrite everything all over again in the cloud? What if I turn it off right now (in the middle of the second upload), turn off iCloud, and delete all my photos. Will iCloud still have the photos that I uploaded 2 hours ago even though the "second" upload is stopped 10% of the way in?

 

[gsmornot]

So I turned off iCloud Photo Library after finishing the upload and was going to delete all my photos stored on the phone but then I forgot something so I went back to iCloud Photo Library and turned it back on. Now it is starting the upload process all over again (literally uploaded 500MB of 19GB for the past few minutes). Is this normal? Just by turning off and turning on iCloud Photo Library, it will overwrite everything all over again in the cloud? What if I turn it off right now (in the middle of the second upload), turn off iCloud, and delete all my photos. Will iCloud still have the photos that I uploaded 2 hours ago even though the "second" upload is stopped 10% of the way in?

It's weird in that way that yes, it will run through all of the photos again to verify it has all of them just as if this was the first time you turned the service on. Wait it out then do your work.