iCloud How to manage one's iCloud (in particular photo) storage efficiently?

[fiatlux]

Our family 200GB iCloud+ storage is now running out of space and the only option seems to go for the top 2TB tier. 9.99$/€ per month is not the end of the world but this is yet another subscription and I'd rather use my existing quota more efficiently if it was possible.

I wondered about moving to Apple One and at least benefit from additional services but

1. I can't see the family switching entirely from Spotify and Netflix so this would not help in terms of subscription creep; and
2. There does not seem to be any Apple One Premier offer in my country so I am not sure how you could combine Apple One and 2TB of data.

When I look at the data on our iCloud I see that most of that space is taken by photos. I don't really need all my photos in the cloud and would ideally use iCloud as a conduit to save my iPhone shots to my Mac. Is there a way to setup iCloud to do that kind of things? Or alternatively to only delete older photos online but back them up on my Mac? iCloud seems to be designed as the backup place for all things residing on your Apple devices which is understandable in some ways but this also means that data stored on iCloud will keep growing forever with very little control on the user's side...

 

[Slartibart]

While this does not help with implementing some form of advanced photo management using iCloud, if you by chance have an Amazon Prime subscription you have access to unlimited photo storage via Amazon Photos already. Use this to backup and keep all current photo graphs - then clean out the iCloud account.

 

[fiatlux]

While this does not help with implementing some form of advanced photo management using iCloud, if you by chance have an Amazon Prime subscription you have access to unlimited photo storage via Amazon Photos already. Use this to backup and keep all current photo graphs - then clean out the iCloud account.

I do, and was surprised that Amazon would also accept RAW files even if uploading 2TB worth of photos isn't entirely practical with my Internet connection (most of my photo collection was shot using DSLRs/hybrids over the last 20y and not kept in Apple Photos anyway)

Still, how would I clean out the iCloud account from unwanted pictures? The automatic syncing of (recent) photos between my Apple devices is actually a desirable thing, it is just that I would like the old stuff to be regularly archived and removed from the cloud.