For anyone who feels like they’ve been held hostage by iCloud’s 5 GB on free storage space or just want to try out another photo storage app, this week Apple launched a new service designed to make it much easier to transfer photos and videos stored in iCloud to Google Photos.
As reported by MacRumors and further detailed in Apple’s support pagesApple’s new transfer service allows users in the US, Canada, Australia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, the UK and the European Union to easily move content stored in iCloud to Google Photos.
Assuming you already have accounts for both services and have the correct credentials (including active two-factor authentication set on your Apple ID), the whole process is quite simple. All you have to do is Sign up here with your Apple ID, select “Transfer a copy of your data” and follow the rest of the steps.
The important thing to know is that the service sends a copy of your photos and videos to Google, which means that all original files in iCloud remain untouched and not deleted. However, because Google doesn’t support the exact same set of file types as Apple, things like Live Photos, Smart Albums, and some RAW files may not be available or may not display properly in Google Photos.
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If you run out of space in Google Photos during the transfer, you will need to manually purchase more storage space yourself and redo the transfer. The same goes for any last minute changes, deletions, or additions you make just before starting the transfer that may not have been includedThere are also a few fine details, like Apple only transfers the most recent edit of a photo and cannot transfer photos that are part of shared albums.
But all in all, it is quite simple. T.The only real downside is that depending on the amount of data and some other factors, the transfer can take anywhere from three to seven days.
The only interesting coincidence is that Apple’s new iCloud transfer service is coming just a few months before Google is shutting down unlimited photo storage in Google Photos in JuneThis is also because Apple is under scrutiny by lawmakers and in a legal battle with Epic Games over its alleged anti-competitive behavior. With Apple, however, it will soon be less of a concern people who may be jumping from iCloud in search of more free storage (Google Photos offers 15 GB of free storage compared to iCloud’s 5 GB, but it is certainly no longer unlimited maybe the timing of Apple’s new photo transfer service isn’t all that coincidental after all.