iCloud Photo Syncing Question

[mdwsta4]

I’ve been an iPhone user since the very first model so we’re talking roughly 15 years at this point. I’ve historically backed up my phones to my Macs and have subsequently restored new phones from backups. My latest phone was a 12 Pro and nearly 60GB was filled up by garbage ‘other’ space that I don’t have the ability to delete nor does Apple give me the insight as to what this stuff actually is.

Just upgraded to the new 15 Pro and decided it was time to set the phone up from scratch. With the standard 5GB iCloud storage, iMessages and bookmarks sync just fine, whatever apps I wanted to keep I just download again. No problems. The one thing I am running into an issue with is photos. I have about 1,000 photos in the main camera album. These are not backed up in iCloud.

If I sync these photos in iCloud on my 12 Pro, will these then get transferred to the regular camera roll on the 15? Can iCloud then be turned off so they’re stored on the device and not iCloud? This is really the main reason I’ve kept backups for so long. I like keeping memories in this main folder and don’t want to bother making additional folders for these specific photos (I keep albums for other images/categories).

In searching I haven’t been able to find anyone asking this question. Any help?

 

[MBAir2010]

me too, i'm worried if I turn one device off, do we lose all the photos?
I read horror stories here of that happened these past 15 years as well.

I need to delete an inherited 15 GB of documents somehow were stored in iCloud
from a MacBook that Catalina decided to put there because I forgot to un-click an option yesterday.
after turning off iCloud on the MBP I still have these files I cant locate
using the iPhone and iPod, as  wants me to use only.

so im deleting all 36GB of iCloud Photos by exporting albums.
BUT
the iPad iPhone and MacBook Air wont sync so I have no idea what is what!

we need an expert in iCloud studies to see this thread soon!

 

[Kottu]

If you have a Mac, export all originals from apple photos app ( in mac) go through files and confirm all of your photos are there, then delete iCloud storage.
Once you clear the storage, upload photos through Mac again.

 

[MBAir2010]

If you have a Mac, export all originals from apple photos app ( in mac) go through files and confirm all of your photos are there, then delete iCloud storage.
Once you clear the storage, upload photos through Mac again.

That was my game plan.
putting these in albums help i hope?

 

[Kottu]

If you think that only documents have eaten up your space, why don’t you just login to iCloud in mac and delete them?
If you have time to go through all your pictures and arrange them, if you create albums in Apple photos with iCloud on, it would reflect in your iOS devices.
Make sure that you make several backups. Now I am trying to clean up my storage. When I put back only HEIC files Photos app showed that there are similar files already, so I chose not to upload. That warning came because I hadn’t emptied thrash in iCloud, before I have realised that, I had deleted them from my mac. Fortunately I do have a backup in another drive.