How to turn off iCloud Photos on iPhone and iPad
ICloud Photos is a great way to seamlessly backup iPhone photos to iCloud. But if you're running out of iCloud storage space and prefer not to upgrade to a paid plan, here's how to turn off iCloud Photos.
Do not worry. You can turn off iCloud Photos without losing any photos or videos. But before you start, we invite you to make a backup of all your photos and videos. You can download all the photos and videos using the iCloud website, or you can transfer the photos to your Mac or PC.
Prepare to turn off iCloud Photos
To get started, open the “Settings” app on your iPhone or iPad.
Then go to the "Photos" section.
Before disabling the feature, let's talk about what happens with your photos and videos after you turn it off. If you use the "Optimize iPhone storage" function, you will not have a copy of all your photos locally. Many photos will only be a compressed version.
Before disabling iCloud Photos, we recommend that you go to the “Download and keep originals” option. This will upload a full resolution copy of all photos and videos in iCloud (taken from all of your Apple devices). If you don't have enough storage space to do this, upload photos to the iCloud website before proceeding further.
If you're using iCloud Photos on a separate device (like a Mac or iPad), the original full-resolution versions will still be available on other devices that use iCloud Photos.
But the photos will be deleted from your current device. Apple will keep a copy of your data for 30 days, so don't worry. You can still recover your data by re-enabling the feature and using the “Download and keep originals” option.
Disable iCloud Photos
Once your photos are securely downloaded and backed up, tap the button next to the “iCloud Photos” option to turn off the feature.
If you use the “Optimize iPhone Storage” feature, you will see a pop-up asking if you want to download a copy of your iCloud photos to your iPhone. Here, choose the option “Upload photos and videos”.
If your iPhone or iPad has no storage space and you are sure you have a backup, you can choose the “Remove from iPhone” option.
In a few seconds, the iCloud Photos feature will be disabled. To check the freed storage space, go to your profile in the Settings app and choose the “iCloud” option.
You can turn the feature back on at any time in the Settings app. Just go to the "Photos" section and tap the toggle next to the "iCloud Photos" option to enable the feature.
Just because you've stopped using iCloud Photos doesn't mean you stop backing up your Photo Library. Google Photos, for example, is a great alternative to iCloud Photos. Apple makes it easy to migrate your entire iCloud Photo Library to Google Photos with just a few clicks!
