Turn on iCloud Photo Library. On your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iOS 10.3 or later, go to Settings your name iCloud Photos, then turn on iCloud Photo Library. In iOS 10.2 or earlier, go to Settings iCloud Photos. On your Mac with OS X 10.10.3 or later, go to System Preferences iCloud.
iCloud Photos is an optional backup feature on Apple devices that securely stores your photos and videos online in the cloud. It’s helpful because it means that even if you were to lose your device, you won’t lose your photographs.
- Apr 10, 2017 iCloud Photo Library is a great feature built into Apple’s iOS and macOS operating systems, but it can feel a bit foreign depending on how you have been managing your photos.
- Nov 26, 2018 You can upload your photos and videos from your PC to iCloud Photos when you follow these steps: Open a File Explorer window. Under Favorites, click iCloud Photos. Click Upload photos and videos. Choose the photos and videos you want to upload and click Open.
Keep reading to find out how to check if iCloud Photo Library is enabled on your device, plus how to turn it off – and what happens if you do.
How do I know if iCloud Photo Library is enabled?
Not sure if iCloud Photo Library is enabled on your device? Here’s how to check.
1. On your device, open Settings.
2. Tap your name.
3. Tap iCloud.
4. Tap Photos.
5. Here you can see if the toggle for iCloud Photos is set to On or Off.
What happens when you turn off iCloud Photo Library on your iPhone?
If you turn off the iCloud Photo Library on your iPhone, it will remove any images in the Photo Stream that weren’t taken on that device. This means that any photos or videos captured on your iPad or Mac will no longer show in the Camera Roll on your phone.
How to turn off iCloud Photo Library
Turning off the iCloud Photo Library is a simple process. However, before you turn it off, make sure you’ve backed up your device to ensure you don’t accidentally lose your images. Once that’s done, here’s how to turn off iCloud Photo Library on your device.
1. Within the Settings app, tap your name.
2. Tap iCloud.
3. Tap Photos.
4. Toggle iCloud Photos to the Off position.
5. Tap Remove from iPhone to remove images taken on your other Apple devices from your iPhone’s Camera Roll.
How to turn off iCloud Photo Library without deleting photos on your iPhone
If you turn off the iCloud Photo Library, it will remove photos from your iPhone that weren’t taken on that device. If you want to turn off iCloud Photo Library but keep your Camera Roll as it is, here’s how to ensure current iCloud images aren’t removed during the process.
1. Within the Settings app, tap your name.
2. Tap iCloud.
3. Tap Photos.
4. Toggle iCloud Photos to the Off position.
5. Tap Download Photos & Videos. This will download all images from the iCloud Photo Library onto your device before disabling the synchronization going forward.
Turn off iCloud Photo Library without deleting photos on your Mac
If you’re using a Mac, the process for turning off iCloud Photo Library is slightly different. Here’s how.
1. On your Mac, open Photos.
2. Tap Preferences.
3. Tap the iCloud tab.
4. Ensure iCloud Photo Library and Download Originals are selected. This will download and keep all images on your Mac.
5. Alternatively, if you have Optimize Mac Storage selected, simply select Download Originals instead and wait for the download to complete. You can then turn off iCloud Photo Library without losing any of your images.
How to disable iCloud Photo Library on only one device
If you’re looking to turn off iCloud Photos on just one of your devices, the process changes slightly depending on what device you’re using.
Here’s how to turn off iCloud Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
1. On your device, open Settings.
2. Tap your name.
3. Tap iCloud.
4. Tap Photos.
5. Toggle iCloud Photos to the Off position.
Here’s how to turn off iCloud Photos on your Mac.
1. On your Mac, open System Preferences.
2. Click iCloud.
3. Next to Photos, click Options.
4. Deselect iCloud Photos.
What does iCloud Photo Library do for my iPhone Photo Library?
This optional feature from Apple lets you automatically backup and sync photos and videos from your iPhone Photo Library into one easy-to-access place – the cloud. This means you can access your Photo Library from any device, wherever you are, as long as you have iCloud photos enabled across all devices.
What’s more, edits are saved across devices, so you can begin retouching your latest selfie on your iPhone, then finish editing the same snap on your iPad.
What do I lose by turning off iCloud Photos?
If you have an iPhone and iPad with iCloud sharing enabled on both, all photos and videos will be shared across both devices. However, if you turn iCloud photos off on your phone, your iPhone’s Camera Roll will lose any images that weren’t created on that device (if you haven’t downloaded them already, that is). Images taken on your iPad, for example, will no longer show in your iPhone’s Camera Roll and vice versa.
If you sign out of iCloud accidentally, Apple holds your images in the cloud for 30 days, meaning you can simply reconnect to your iCloud Photo Library to restore your images if needed.
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Experience the joy of creating personalized photo projects with Motif. Our photo book app seamlessly works with Apple Photos in macOS and iOS, doing the heavy-lifting while leaving the creative freedom to you.When you turn off an iCloud feature on a device, information stored only in iCloud for that feature is no longer available on the device. If you turn off Mail, Contacts, Calendars, Notes, Reminders, or iCloud Photos on just one device, you can still view and change your information on iCloud.com and on another device you set up for that feature.
Sometimes when you turn off an iCloud feature on a device, you can choose to keep a copy of the feature’s information on that device. The copied information isn’t kept in sync with iCloud. If you turn off Mail, Contacts, Calendars, and Tasks in iCloud for Windows on a Windows computer, information stored in iCloud remains available in Microsoft Outlook, but it isn’t kept up to date with your other devices.
Before you turn off a particular feature on all of your devices, or before turning off iCloud completely, you can make a copy of the information you keep in iCloud on your computer. If you want to delete information and backups stored in iCloud, learn how to manage your iCloud storage.
Turn iCloud features on or off
Depending on which device settings you want to change, do one or more of the following.
Turn Off Icloud Photo Library
On your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch
If you're using iOS 10.3 or later:
- Go to Settings > [your name].
- Tap iCloud.
- Tap to turn iCloud features on or off.
On your Mac
- Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, then click Apple ID. If you’re using macOS Mojave or earlier, you don’t need to click Apple ID.
- Click iCloud.
- Select or deselect each feature.
Some features aren’t available or are listed differently in earlier macOS versions.
On your Windows PC
How Do I Turn On Icloud Photo Library On My Mac
- Open iCloud for Windows.
- Select or deselect each feature.
- Click Apply.
Some features aren’t available on your PC, or are listed differently, depending on whether your computer has Microsoft Outlook 2016 or earlier installed.
If you have Outlook installed, use iCloud Mail, Contacts, Calendars, and Tasks in Outlook. If you turn off Mail, Contacts, Calendars, and Tasks, the iCloud information remains available in Microsoft Outlook, but it isn’t kept up to date with iCloud. If you don't have Outlook installed, use iCloud Mail, Contacts, Calendars, and Reminders in your web browser on iCloud.com.
iCloud reminders are called Tasks in Outlook 2016.
If you select Bookmarks, and your computer has Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox installed, you can click Options to select the Windows browsers whose bookmarks you want to keep up to date with bookmarks in Safari on your iOS devices and Mac computers set up for iCloud Safari. Learn more about the browsers supported by iCloud for Windows.
Turn off iCloud
To stop using iCloud on all or only some of your devices, follow these steps.
If you sign out of iCloud (or delete iCloud), iCloud no longer backs up the information on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. You can still back up your device from your computer.
If you turned on automatic download of music, app, or book purchases in iTunes preferences or in Settings on your iOS device, your iTunes purchases are still downloaded to your devices.