iOS 18.1 beta 3 launched on August 29, including a new 'Clean Up' tool in Apple's Photos app, powered by Apple Intelligence.

First showcased at WWDC in June, Apple's yearly developer conference, Apple Intelligence is the company's initiative to enhance its software suite with AI-powered features. The 'Clean Up' tool allows users to remove objects from a photo's background by simply drawing a circle around the area they want to change.

This tool works on any photo stored in the Photos app, so if you want to remove something from a photo taken in 2015, you can do it. It's worth noting that you can also use 'Clean Up' in iPadOS 18.1 beta 3 and macOS Sequoia 15.1 beta 3.

Another feature in this latest beta release is the expansion of Notification Summaries to other apps beyond Mail and Messages. This means Apple Intelligence will now group up new notifications from any app, including third-party ones, summarise each one, and display it on your iPhone's lock screen.

Apple says iOS 18.1 will arrive later this year for compatible iPhones, with Apple Intelligence coming as part of iOS 18.1 for U.S. users to begin with.

How to use Clean Up in Photos

As long as you're running iOS 18.1 beta 3, iPadOS 18.1 beta 3, and macOS Sequoia 15.1 beta 3, you can use the 'Clean Up' feature in Apple's Photos app — here's how:

• Go to any photo in the Photos app, then press Edit.
• A notification will pop up, explaining that it needs to 'download the models' for the feature.
• Once it's finished, simply use your finger, or Apple Pencil when using iPadOS 18.1 to draw a circle over an object you want to remove.
• After a few seconds, the object you've highlighted will be gone!

Bang, and the object is gone! 'Clean Up' could easily become the standout feature of Apple Intelligence once it's made available to U.S. users later this year. The tool's appeal lies in its simplicity of drawing a circle around an object in a photo, and it's removed in seconds.

If you're on the beta, give it a try with a bunch of photos and share your results in the iMore Forums.

More from iMore

• Apple event to launch iPhone 16 will take place on September 9 – called "It's Glowtime"
• iPhone 15 Pro vs iPhone 16 Pro: Every rumored upgrade coming later this year
• iPhone 16 Pro leak at last reveals what the bronze color will look like

After releasing iOS 17.5, users have been reporting a bug that causes previously deleted photos to make a reappearance. It's affecting all kinds of deleted photos, but lots of users are reporting private images being resurfaced. And now, it seems like this bug is getting worse.

One Reddit user shared that their photos were resurfaced after factory resetting the device and selling it to somebody else. Other users were quick to comment with similar stories, with a handful dating back some time.

The original poster clarified that they followed Apple's official support guide on resetting their iPad. They then handed the device to the person that bought it, and did not sign in to their iCloud account again. Yet, the deleted photos still resurfaced on the device when it was set up again as new, and with a different iCloud account.

This additional development seems to suggest that the bug is related to the devices themselves, rather than the iCloud accounts attached. It's concerning for iPhone photographers who deleted photos and might not want to see them again. And, if you re-delete your photos, will they stay deleted?

Wait, what's happening?

This iOS 17.5 bug was first reported by MacRumors and is being discussed on Reddit. Users are reporting that photos they've deleted are being resurfaced, appearing as if they were brand-new. Previously, it appeared as though the files were new ones being provided by iCloud, but this latest development may suggest otherwise.

Photos dating back to 2010 are being resurfaced, even after being deleted repeatedly. It's still unclear exactly what is happening right now, nor do we know how people can fix the issue. Apple has still not addressed the issue.

More from iMore

• iPhone Photography Week: Tons of tips, guides and photo editing expertise for iPhone owners
• iPhone 15 Pro Max vs a DSLR camera: iPhone Photography Week showdown
• iPhone Photography Basics: Follow these seven tips to improve your pictures instantly

The best iPhones are famously good devices when it comes to imagery. From taking photos to editing them, you can get an image looking good with nothing but some software and a little bit of time. However, just getting a quick crop has previously required going into the image itself, opening up a different editor built into Photos, finding the crop you like, and hitting save. Ever since iOS 17, there has been a new, much more efficient way of doing it. 

You can now crop your images with just a single tap, and save with another. This is not only quicker than before but much easier. The crop tool previously hogged up some of the screen so getting a super precise crop could be a little tricky but now, that’s a thing of the past. 

Here’s how to crop images on iPhone in a single tap.

How to quickly crop images on iPhone

To crop your images on iPhone, you simply have to click on any image you have saved and pinch to zoom in. From here, at the top right of the screen, it should say ‘Crop’. Click on ‘Crop’ and you will then be sent into Photos’ own editor with the crop automatically applied. Just click done at the top right to save your new image. 

It is worth noting that the ‘Crop’ option won’t pop up if you only lightly zoom in so you will still need to go into the editor for that. As well as this, clicking done will save over your previous image with the new crop so make sure to have a backup if you want both photos on your iPhone. 

If you have just taken a picture with your camera, you don’t need to go into Photos to access this crop ability. You can simply click on the image preview in the bottom left corner of the Camera app, pinch to zoom in, and crop the photo you just took. 

It has never been easier, and quicker, to crop images on iPhone than it is right now. 

iCloud is Apple's cloud-based storage service. It allows you to securely store your files, photos through iCloud Photo Library, passwords, notes and other kinds of data in the cloud. It offers other features too, like multi-device backup, syncing your calendars and more. You can then access everything from any Apple device, including the latest devices from the brand, like the iPhone 14 Pro and MacBook Air with M2. It's a great alternative to using one of the best flash drives instead for your iPhone. 

But which iCloud storage plan should you get? All iCloud accounts get 5GB of online storage space for free, but if you plan to use either the file storage or backup features, that 5GB can vanish in an instant.

Luckily, Apple provides a number of different paid storage options for its users, which are called iCloud+. So if you're close to your storage limit or have already run out, you might be considering the best Apple iCloud plan to cover your needs. Here's everything you need to know about iCloud+.

What are iCloud's storage tiers?

Apple currently offers four different subscription tiers, one that is the regular, free-to-use iCloud and three paid tiers for iCloud+. These subscriptions can be split between all the devices you're using. This includes iPhones, iPads, Macs, and supported Windows computers.

Note: If you're on a Family Sharing plan and purchase the $2.99 or $9.99/month plans, you can share your storage space with up to five other family members. While you'll share the total space, everyone will have private iCloud accounts and private storage, and individual members can always buy their own space if necessary.

• Free: 5GB of storage
• $0.99/month: 50GB of storage
• $2.99/month: 200GB of storage
• $9.99/month: 2TB of storage

Here's what counts toward your iCloud storage space:

• Anything you store in iCloud Drive
• App data stored in iCloud
• Contacts, calendar, mail, notes, and reminders data stored in iCloud
• Photos and videos stored in iCloud Photo Library
• iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch backups
• Any tracks you upload to your iCloud Music Library
• Desktop and Documents sync for macOS

Which is the best iCloud storage plan for you?

When debating which iCloud storage plan to choose, you should ask yourself a few key questions:

• Are you running out of iCloud storage space due to your iPhone and iPad backups alone?
• Do you use iCloud Drive to store your documents, or do you store files in another cloud service like Dropbox or Google Drive?
• Do you use iCloud Photo Library to store your pictures and videos, or another cloud photo service like Google Photos or Dropbox?
• Do you plan to use iCloud's Desktop and Documents feature to sync multiple Macs?

If you plan to regularly use iCloud's various features, you'll likely need the storage space to match. 

What about Apple One's storage plan?

Apple recently revealed a new all-in-one subscription service called Apple One, which bundles a number of Apple's key features together, including iCloud. 

Apple One consists of up to six Apple services, including Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Arcade, Apple News+, Apple Fitness+, and iCloud storage.

There's a total of three plans to choose from, and depending on which one you choose, you'll get more iCloud storage.

If you have friends and family who are also planning on buying iCloud storage, the Family Plan is great option. Not only you get 200 GB of iCloud storage, but you'll also get access to all the other Apple services you might already use.

The Premier Plan is also a great option if you need 2TB of space, plus all the other Apple services, including the upcoming Apple Fitness+, which is not available in other plans. And, just like with the family plan, if you plan to split the payment with five other people, it would actually be cheaper than just buying 2TB.

Although, international readers should keep in mind that the Premier Plan will only be available in the US, the United Kingdom, Australia and Canada.

How to buy more iCloud storage

If you've decided which is the best iCloud storage plan for you, it's easy to upgrade right from your iPhone, iPad, or Mac.

1. Open Settings on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Apple ID banner at the top of the screen.
3. Tap iCloud.

4. Tap on Manage Storage.
5. Tap Change Storage Plan.
6. Tap on an available plan to upgrade your storage.

7. Tap Buy.
8. Enter your iCloud account password
9. Tap OK.

1. Open the System Preferences app.
2. Select the iCloud tab.
3. Click on Manage.
4. Click the Change Storage Plan button. (You may have to enter your Apple ID and password.)

5. Choose your new plan.
6. Press Done.

1. Open Settings on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Apple ID banner.
3. Tap iCloud.

4. Tap on the Manage Storage.
5. Tap Change Storage Plan.
6. Tap Downgrade Options.

7. Choose which plan you want to downgrade to.
8. Tap Done.
9. Tap Downgrade.

1. Open the System Preferences app.
2. Select the iCloud tab.
3. Click on Manage.
4. Click the Change Storage Plan button. (You may have to enter your Apple ID and password.)
5. Click the Downgrade Options button.

6. Choose your new plan.
7. Press Done.

What other iCloud storage options are there?

If you're not sold on buying an iCloud storage plan, there are plenty of other cloud storage services available. If you want the best option for your budget, you can check out our guide to which cloud storage has the best value, which covers a range of options, including iCloud, Dropbox and more.

What about iCloud Photo Library?

Your iCloud Photo Library is where all of your photos are stored within your iCloud account. That means the storage option you choose will cover the Photo Library.

We've got plenty of guides to help you get you up-and-running and get the most of the service, including how to set up and use iCloud Photo Library on iPhone and iPad and how to back up your iCloud Photo Library.

Apple's iCloud service offers a number of features for users who want to share items with their colleagues, friends, and family. iCloud Photo Sharing is one of those. You can use the Photos app on iPhone, iPad, or Mac (or a PC) to add images to a shared album that your friends and family can then access, comment on, and even add their own contributions to the set. It's also possible to share photos with Family Sharing and iCloud.

Once you've set up iCloud Photo Sharing, here's how you can create, view, and edit shared photo albums on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, or PC.

How to view shared photo albums on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and PC

Note that by default, when you open the Shared section in Photos on the best iPhone and iPad, you'll be taken to your activity feed for shared albums, which shows things that have been added or comments that have been made.

On iPhone and iPad

1. Open Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Albums tab.
3. Scroll down until you see the Shared Albums category and tap See All to view shared albums.

On your Mac

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Tap the Shared Albums section on the sidebar.

From here, you have two options for viewing shared images:

• Activity: This mode lets you view all recent activity in your shared albums
• Shared Albums: This shows you all your currently shared albums and all albums shared with you.

On your PC

1. Open your iCloud Photos folder.

From here, you have two options for viewing shared images:

• Activity: This album lets you view all recent activity in your shared albums.
• Open a folder: The other folders in your iCloud Photos library include your shared albums and any regular albums you've created.

How to create a shared photo album on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac

If you want to share photos with your friends and family, you can create a shared photo album through iCloud and invite them to view it.

Note: In order for your recipients to properly view these images, you'll need to add the contact information they use for their iCloud account — it may well be different than their regular contact info, so make sure to check if you're in doubt.

On iPhone and iPad

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. From the albums tab, scroll down to Shared Albums and tap See All.
3. Tap Edit in the upper right corner.

4. Tap Add button in the upper left corner. It looks like a plus symbol (+).
5. Name your album and tap Next.
6. Add the contacts you want to share the album with and tap Create.

7. Tap on the newly created Shared Photo Album.
8. Tap the Add button in the album tray. It looks like a plus symbol (+).

9. Select photos you want to add and tap Done in the upper right corner.
10. Add a comment, if you like, and tap Post.

You can repeat steps 7-10 every time you want to add a new photo or video.

On your Mac

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click on Shared Albums in the sidebar.

3. Click on the Add symbol next to the word "Shared Albums" in the sidebar.
4. Name the album and enter the contact for your friends and family. Make sure you use their iCloud contacts.

5. Click on Create.
6. Double or Control-Click on the newly created Shared Photo Album.

7. Click on Add photos and videos in the upper left corner of the window.
8. Select the photos you want to add to your Shared Photo Album and click on Add in the upper right corner.

You can repeat steps 6-8 every time you want to add a new photo or video.

On your PC

1. Open your iCloud Photos folder.
2. Open (or create) the folder where you wish to add your new images.
3. Click the New shared album button.
4. Add all email addresses for your friends and family.

5. Give the album a name.
6. Click Next.
7. Select all the photos you want to add from your computer.
8. Click Done.

All the photos added to this folder will now be available as a shared album; anyone you invited will be able to access them after pressing OK.

How to add images and video to a shared photo album on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, or PC

Once you've created an album, you can add more images or videos to it at any time with the tap of a few buttons. Here's how.

On iPhone or iPad

1. Open the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Select the Albums tab and scroll down until you see Shared Albums.
3. If you don't see the album you want right away, tap See All to view all shared albums.

4. Tap on the album you'd like to add photos to.
5. Press the plus button square at the top of the album.

6. Select the images you wish to add and press Done.
7. Add a comment, if you like, and tap Post.

On your Mac

1. Open the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Choose the Shared Album where you want to add more images and video.

3. Click on the Add photos and videos button at the top of the album.
4. Choose the images you want to add and press Add.

On your PC

1. Open your iCloud Photos folder.
2. Open the folder where you wish to add your new images or video.
3. Click on the Add photos or videos button.

4. Choose the new images or video you wish to add to the folder.
5. Once you're ready, press Done.

How to delete images from a shared photo album on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, or PC

Don't want to share a particular picture or video after all? You can delete images from your shared photo album at any time — even if you weren't the one who added them!

Note: Anyone you've added to a shared photo album can download their own copy of an image or video once it's been added to the album. If you delete the photo or video after it's been available in the album, there's a chance it may have already been downloaded to another device.

On iPhone and iPad

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. From the Albums tab, select the Shared Album you wish to delete photos from.
3. Tap Select in the upper right corner.

4. Select the photos you want to delete and tap the Trash icon in the bottom right corner.
5. Confirm by tapping Delete Photos.

This will remove the photos or videos in the album for all of your iCloud connected devices and any friends you gave access to the album.

On your Mac

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click on the Shared Photo Album from which you want to delete photos.

3. Right or Control-Click on the photo you want to delete.
4. Select Delete from Shared Album from the list of options.
5. Click on Delete to confirm that you want to remove the photo from the shared album.

On your PC

1. Open your iCloud Photos folder.
2. Open the shared folder in question.
3. Delete or move the images you'd like to remove from the shared photo album.

How to subscribe to a shared photo album on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, or PC

When someone invites you to a shared photo album, you'll have to subscribe before you can view photos and video (and, if the owner has allowed you to, add your own images and video). Here's how to do it.

On iPhone or iPad

1. Open the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Select the For You tab.
3. Under Invitations, tap Accept or Decline to join or reject a shared album.

On your Mac

1. Open the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Select the Activity album under the Shared section of the sidebar.
3. Under Invitations, tap Accept or Decline to join or reject a shared album.

On your PC

1. Open your iCloud Photos folder.
2. Select the Activity folder.
3. Under Invitations, tap Accept or Decline to join or reject a shared album.

How to unsubscribe from a shared photo album on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, or PC

Decided you no longer want to be part of a shared photo album someone else sent you? It's a simple process to unsubscribe from that album.

On iPhone or iPad

1. Open the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Scroll down to Shared Albums and choose the album in question.
3. Select the People tab.

4. Tap on the Unsubscribe button.
5. Press the Unsubscribe button once more to confirm.

On your Mac

1. Launch the Photos app.
2. From the Shared Albums tab, choose the album in question.
3. Select the People icon in the toolbar.

4. Tap on the Unsubscribe button.
5. Press the Unsubscribe button once more to confirm.

On your PC

1. Open your iCloud Photos folder.
2. Choose the folder you'd like to delete.
3. Click Info.
4. In the box that appears, click Unsubscribe in the bottom left corner.

How to delete a shared photo album on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, or PC

If you decide you no longer want to share an album with a group, you can delete it; this removes it from iCloud on all your connected devices and all those you shared it with. (If you want to remove a shared album from your device that someone else created, you'll have to unsubscribe instead of deleting it.)

Note: Anyone you've added to a shared photo album can download their own copy of an image or video once it's been added to the album. If you delete the photo or video after it's been available in the album, there's a chance it may have already been downloaded to another device.

On iPhone and iPad

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Scroll down to Shared Albums and tap See All.
3. Tap Edit in the upper left corner.

4. Tap the red Delete icon next to the shared album you want to delete.
5. Tap Delete to confirm deletion.

On your Mac

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Right or Control-click on the Shared Photo Album you want to delete.
3. Select Delete Shared Album from the list of options and tap Delete once more to confirm.

On your PC

1. Open your iCloud Photos folder.
2. Find the shared folder in question.
3. Delete it.

Sharing simplified

Now that you know how to create and share albums in iCloud Photo Sharing, you can easily involve family and friends in your photo adventures. Once you have this down, it's an easy and intuitive way to safely share photos with anyone you like.

Updated August 2022: Updated for latest operating system.

While most of your photos are probably on your iPhone thanks to the built-in Photos app, what about the images that you have on your favorite Mac? We're talking about your stunning photos taken with your DSLR of choice, a point-and-shoot camera, or just images that you've collected from all over the internet? How are you supposed to get those pictures on your Mac to your iPhone or iPad?

The easiest solution is probably to use the iCloud Photo Library because all of your photos, whether from your iPhone 13 Pro, iPad, or Mac, get synced in full resolution across all of your devices. But of course, this requires enough space for your entire photo library, which means you need a paid iCloud storage tier. Thankfully, there are other ways to transfer photos from your Mac to your iPhone, so don't sweat it — we'll show you all you need to know. And we also have a guide on how to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Mac instead, if you need that too.

What content can I view on my iPhone or iPad?

The Photos app on iPhone and iPad can display several different types of file formats without issue. These will all appear fine in the Photos app, but you won't be able to tell what format they are on the surface — it will all appear rather seamless.

• JPEG
• PNG
• TIFF
• RAW
• HEIF (these are HEIC images and is what your iPhone saves natively if High Efficiency is turned on)
• Live Photos
• GIF (these only animate in the Photos app on iOS 11 or later or macOS High Sierra or later)
• MP4 video
• HEVC video (similar to HEIC, it is the High-Efficiency video format)
• Slo-mo video
• Time-lapse video

As long as your photo or video is in one of these formats, it will show up fine in the iOS Photos app once you transfer photos from your Mac to your iPhone. Otherwise, you'll want to consider using the iOS Files app.

How to use iCloud Photo Library

iCloud Photo Library is probably the easiest way to keep your photos on Mac and iPhone in sync, but you do need a newer Mac that can get the Photos app on it (macOS Yosemite and later). Here's how to enable the iCloud Photo Library.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click Photos in the top left of the menu bar and select Preferences (or click the Command and , keys on the keyboard).
3. Click the iCloud tab.
4. Make sure that the iCloud Photos option is checked.

If this is the first time you are launching Photos on Mac in macOS Catalina or later, you may need to make sure that the System Photo Library is on before you can enable the iCloud Photos option.

1. In the Preferences for Photos app, click General.

2. Click Use as System Photo Library. It may take a little bit of time to complete.

When you have the iCloud Photos option enabled on your Mac, you will want to ensure that it's also enabled on your iPhone or iPad.

1. Launch Settings on your iPhone.
2. Scroll down and tap on Photos.

3. Tap the toggle for iCloud Photos to ON (green).
4. You can also turn the toggle for Shared Albums to ON (green) if you want to share your iCloud Photos albums with others.

Once iCloud Photos is enabled, it may take up to 24 hours before all of your content is synced up between devices. iCloud Photos also won't sync unless you're on WiFi, so make sure that's good to go before wondering where all of your content is.

Upload photos from iCloud.com

If you don't want to deal with iCloud Photos (it does come with some headaches), you can actually use the good old-fashioned method of uploading to the web. That's right — iCloud Photos can be accessed from the web, and it's another way to transfer photos from Mac to iPhone, or any platform, really.

1. Make sure that you have iCloud Photos enabled on your iOS devices.
2. Visit icloud.com and sign in to your Apple ID.
3. Click the Photos icon.

4. After everything loads up, click the Upload button (it looks like an up arrow to a cloud icon).

5. Choose the images from your hard drive that you want to upload.
6. Click Choose.

Your images will then get uploaded to iCloud Photos manually. A progress bar at the bottom of the screen lets you know how the uploads are going, and you can click Stop Upload at any time if you change your mind.

Sync via iTunes or Finder

For those who don't want to use iCloud Photos, you can do the good ol' syncing method with the computer itself. You know, with a — * le gasp* — cable.

If you are using macOS Mojave or earlier, then you will do this with iTunes. But if you are on macOS Catalina and later, you do this through the Finder, since Apple split iTunes up into separate Music, TV, and Podcasts apps.

The reason you may want to sync with your Mac with a cable is that because you may be running an older version of iPhoto or Aperture, you may have certain albums in Photos, or you have specific folders or albums of images in your Pictures folder. Therefore, it's important that before you manually sync through iTunes or Finder, you have all of your images that you want to transfer from Mac to iPhone organized appropriately.

1. Ensure your photos are organized the way you want them to be organized.
2. Plug in your iPhone or iPad to your Mac.
3. Launch Finder (iTunes in macOS Mojave and earlier) if it doesn't open automatically.
4. Click on your iOS device icon in the device list.

5. Click the Photos tab.

6. Click the checkbox next to Sync Photos.

7. Click the source of the photos that you want to sync from in the drop-down menu.
8. Click the checkbox next to the option you want: Sync All Folders or Sync Selected Folders.

9. Choose the Folders that you want to sync from your chosen source.
10. Click the checkbox next to Include videos if you want.
11. Click Sync in the bottom right corner to begin syncing.

Use AirDrop to transfer photos from Mac to iPhone

One of the easiest ways to transfer photos from Mac to iPhone is with AirDrop. Apple introduced AirDrop back in OS X Lion (10.7), so your Mac should work with AirDrop, even if it's a little older (Lion works on Macs from 2008).

AirDrop uses Bluetooth Low Energy to broadcast, discover, and negotiate connections, allowing point-to-point Wi-Fi for transferring data. Between Macs and iPhones, and iPads, this is a quick and easy way to transfer files, such as photos and videos.

1. Launch Finder on your Mac.
2. Open a new Finder window or tab so that you can view two Finder locations at once.
3. Locate and select the photos and video that you want to transfer to your iPhone or iPad.
4. In the other Finder window or tab, click AirDrop from the side menu.

5. On your iPhone or iPad, make sure that it is unlocked and awake.
6. Make sure that your iPhone or iPad has AirDrop receiving enabled and set to Everyone.
7. Drag your selected photos and video to the iPhone or iPad option in the AirDrop Finder window.

8. If your iPhone or iPad prompts you, tap Accept.

While AirDrop is excellent, it works best for smaller batches of photos and video rather than your entire photo library. If you want to transfer your entire library, it's best to use iCloud Photos or sync via Finder or iTunes.

Utilize a third-party syncing service

Another great option to consider when you need to transfer photos from Mac to iPhone is to use a third-party syncing service, like Dropbox. For example, you could upload your pictures to your Dropbox account directly on the web or add photos to your Dropbox folder once you install Dropbox on your Mac. Dropbox has an excellent walkthrough to help you get started if you're a newbie to the service. Then on your iPhone or iPad, download the Dropbox app and access your photos and videos directly.

While I prefer to use Dropbox for my photos, there are also other options that you can use, such as Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, Amazon Drive, and more. It just comes down to personal preference here.

Take your photos with you everywhere

We all have a lot of photos that we take and they're probably on our Macs right now. Once we're done editing them, we may want to just have them on our best iPhone to show them off. Thankfully, there are a few ways to get our favorite photos from our Mac to our iPhone, as we just showed you here.

And if you need to do the reverse, which is getting your photos from your iPhone to your Mac, the process is pretty easy and straightforward too. Apple has made it convenient, and you can also use your preferred cloud syncing service of choice too.

Updated August 2022: These are still the current steps for transferring photos from your Mac to your iPhone and iPad.

If you like to have your photos on multiple devices, getting images off your iPhone can be a critically important task. If you have a Mac, you know that Apple makes it easy to move your photos from your iPhone to your Mac in multiple ways. But what about Windows PC owners? Are they left out in the cold?

The good news is that, no, Windows users aren't left behind. In fact, you might say it's just as easy to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Windows PC as it is with your Mac. You have a couple of options for moving over a USB-to-Lightning, as well as iCloud Photo Library, which can indeed be set up on Windows.

Here's what you need to know about how to transfer photos from your iPhone to your PC.

Download iTunes

If you're transferring photos over via one of the best USB-C cables, you'll need to install iTunes for Windows 10 onto your PC. This will allow your iPhone to be recognized by your PC in the File Explorer, which you'll need for the manual transfer.

You can download iTunes for Windows from the Windows Store here.

Connecting your iPhone

Connecting your iPhone to your Windows PC requires a few more steps than just plugging it in.

1. Connect your iPhone to your PC using a USB-to-Lightning cable.Source: Rebecca Spear / iMore

2. Tap Trust on your iPhone. This might take a few seconds to pop up.
3. Enter your passcode on your iPhone.

You should now be able to transfer photos to your Windows PC over a wired connection.

How to transfer photos from your iPhone to your PC with the Windows 10 Photos app

1. While your iPhone is connected to your PC, click the Start button on the lower left side of your PC screen.
2. Scroll down the file menu and select Photos.Source: iMore

3. Select Import.
4. Choose From a connected device.Source: iMore

5. Click the drop down menu under Select.
6. You can choose to import All items or Items since last import.Source: iMore

After making your image import choice, you'll simply need to wait until the PC finishes importing your iPhone images. When that's done, you can close the Photo app and can disconnect your iPhone from the PC.

How to transfer photos from your iPhone to your PC with File Explorer

This isn't the easiest option available, but it is the one that gives you the most choices in where to store your photos.

1. While your iPhone is connected to your PC, click the Start button on the lower left side of your PC screen.
2. Select Pictures.Source: iMore

3. Click This PC from the side bar menu.
4. Now select Apple iPhone or any other name associated with the Apple device you are using.Source: iMore

5. Select Internal Storage.
6. Choose the DCIM folder.Source: iMore

7. If you have more than one file, choose the file you'd like to get pictures from.
8. Using the mouse, click and drag over the images you'd like to bring to your PC. Alternatively, you can press Ctrl + A to select everything.Source: iMore

9. Right click the mouse.
10. Select Copy.Source: Rebecca Spear / iMore and iMore

11. In the side menu, choose the place that you'd like to import these images to. For me that was Pictures.
12. Select any file that you want to place the iPhone images into.Source: iMore

13. Now right click the mouse.
14. Select Paste. After a moment, the images you selected will be brought to your PC.Source: Rebecca Spear / iMore and iMore

Once all of the images have been brought over, you can close the windows you used and then disconnect your iPhone from the PC.

How to transfer photos from your iPhone to your PC over iCloud

Of course, you might not want to bother with a wired connection. Maybe you want your photos to your PC over the cloud. Well, you can do that with iCloud Photo Library. Apple makes an iCloud app for PCs that allows you to set up features like iCloud Photo Library and iCloud Drive on Windows:

How to set up and use iCloud Photo Library on a Windows PC

Mastering easy transfers

As you can see, using an iPhone with a PC computer isn't so hard after all! Apple can play nice with all the other tech brands, as long as you know what you're doing. Maintaining an organized iCloud account can also make a big difference. Once you transfer those photos, back them up on iCloud to make sure they are safe in the future.

Over time, you're going to end up with a lot of photos — especially if you have kids and pets — but even your best iPhone only has so much space. Thankfully, you can store your photo and video memories in the cloud with Apple's own iCloud Photo Library, and everything can be viewed across all of your iPhones, iPads, and Macs, as long as you have the available iCloud storage. It's one of the best ways to keep all of your memories together on your Apple devices.

However, as great as iCloud Photo Library is on your favorite iPhone, iPad, and Mac, it's not failproof (nothing really is). That's why if you are truly serious about keeping all of your pictures and video safe, you want some redundancies in your backup process. I mean, there is no such thing as "too many backups" and it's better to be safe than sorry.

Here are a few ways that you can back up your iCloud photos using your greatest Mac.

How to back up iCloud Photo Library to your Mac's hard drive

The best way to back up the images and video in iCloud Photo Library is to make sure you're downloading all your content onto your Mac.

Note: If you plan to back up your entire digital library to your Mac's hard drive, you'll likely want to do it on a desktop Mac with at least a 1TB drive or more. Otherwise, consider backing up to an external drive.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.

2. Click Photos in the App menu in the upper left corner of your screen.
3. Select Preferences from the drop-down menu.

4. Click the iCloud tab.
5. Click Download Originals to this Mac.

Your Mac will now download full-resolution copies of all your images to your Mac's hard drive, stored inside your Photos app library. Depending on how big your iCloud Photo Library is, it may take a while — just be patient.

How to back up your iCloud Photo Library content to an external drive

There are two ways to back up your iCloud Photo Library to an external drive: backing up your Photos library automatically or manually. (You can also export sections of your library if you don't want to back up the whole thing.)

If you've turned on the Download Originals option for your Photos library, you can back up your Photos library as part of your regular backup routine with Time Machine or even an online clone service like Carbon Copy or BackBlaze. No matter which method you prefer (though it's highly recommended to use both), your Photos library (and all images and video automatically downloaded from iCloud) will be backed up as well. And if you don't currently use a backup service, well... now's a good time to start!

If you've turned on the Download Originals option for your Photos library but don't want to back it up automatically, you can always copy your Photos library to an external drive regularly.

1. Connect an external drive to your Mac via USB, USB-C, or Thunderbolt.
2. Open a new Finder window on your Mac.

3. Click on Pictures in the sidebar.
   • If Pictures is not already in your sidebar, drag the Pictures folder from your Macintosh HD into the sidebar.

4. Drag your Photos Library to your external drive.

5. Wait for it to copy over.

If you have one of the best external hard drives just laying around, you should consider using it for making an external library to backup your iCloud Photo Library. If you go this route, it's highly recommended to set up bi-weekly reminders for the following steps to keep the Photos library backed up regularly.

Don't want to back up your entire library? You can export individual images and videos to your external drive.

1. Connect an external drive to your Mac via USB, USB-C, or Thunderbolt.
2. Open the Photos app.

3. Select the photos and video you want to back up.
4. Go to the File menu.
5. Hover over the Export option.

6. Select either Export # Photos or Video or Export Unmodified Original for # Photos or Videos.

7. Select an option for Photo Kind, information to include (title, keywords, and caption, as well as location information), File Name, and Subfolder Format. The first two options only show up if you chose Export # Photos or Video in Step 6.

8. Press Export.

9. Choose your external drive.
10. Press Export.

How to make an online backup of your iCloud Photo Library

Even though your entire iCloud Photo Library is (as the name implies) stored online in iCloud, it's worth considering a second online backup as one of your redundancies. After all, you can never have too many backups, in all honesty.

Good news: If you already use a service to back up your hard drive and you've already synced your full iCloud Photo Library to your Mac, it's easy to back it all up there too. If not, consider it a good time to start!

If you don't store your iCloud images locally, this is a bit trickier: you can use the external drive method we mentioned above to export portions of your library to an external drive, and then sync that drive to your preferred online backup service, but it's a bit more labor-intensive. In general, this is why I tend to recommend backing up your full library to your Mac or storing a library on an external drive.

Always back it up, and then back it up again!

When it comes to backing up iCloud photos, these are the best solutions possible. It's pretty easy, and we always recommend keeping everything backed up on an external hard drive, as well as an off-site service as well. Remember, you can never have too many backups, and again, it's much better to be safe than sorry.

Updated June 2022: These are still the proper steps to back up your iCloud Photo Library.

There are a number of MacBooks on the market, each offering a powerful Apple silicon chip. Each is terrific for photographers, although we suggest the 16-inch MacBook Pro M3 Max (2023) if your budget allows for it. It's the most potent MacBook available and offers plenty of upgrades to make the base model even more powerful. 

That said, the base M3 Pro is still an incredibly capable laptop, while the 2022 MacBook Air remains our top recommendation for student snappers for whom cash might be a bit tighter. 

We've outlined our top picks below, which are dominated by the various available MacBook Pro configurations. 

Are you looking for something lightweight and ideal for taking to class? We also have the best MacBook for students summed up.

Quick List

The best MacBook for photographers: in depth

The best MacBook for photographers overall

For the professional photographer, there's nothing better than the M3-powered 16-inch MacBook Pro, which Apple introduced in late 2023. Like the 14-inch MacBook Pro (mentioned below), this model offers an M3 Pro or M3 Max SoC with up to 128GB of unified memory and 8TB of SSD storage. That's a lot of storage for your photos and videos. In addition, you can get a 16-core CPU and up to a 40-core GPU.

But there's much more. The latest 16-inch MacBook Pro features a 3456x2234 Liquid Retina XDR display with ProMotion technology for adaptive refresh rates up to 120Hz. It's also packed with up to 22 hours of battery life between charges and comes with a 1080p FaceTime HD camera with an advanced image signal processor and computational video. 

The 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook models (2023) also have a MagSafe charging port, an HDMI port, and an SDXC card slot besides their three (two on the 14-inch model) Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C) ports. If you're looking for any negatives, understand this is the heaviest MacBook Pro in many years (4.8 pounds at top spec). It's also costly, even at the base level.

The latest 16-inch MacBook Pro gives you the most power and performance, though the price tag is high.

The best MacBook for mobility

This laptop is for you if you want mostly everything on the 16-inch MacBook Pro, but with a smaller display. However, it offers most of same internals as the larger model for a little less. You can get a bit more RAM on the top-spec larger laptop, but both the M3 Pro and M3 Pro Max chips are available on the 14-inch mode. Better still, it weighs much less, coming in at 3.4 pounds.

On the negative side, when configured with either of the top-tier chips, the 14-inch MacBook Pro only offers up to 18 hours between charges, with up to 22 hours possible on the 16-inch model. For most on-the-go photographers, though, 18 hours will likely be more than sufficient. 

The 14-inch MacBook Pro is nearly identical to the 16-inch model except for the smaller display and price.

The best MacBook Pro on a budget

At the end of 2023, Apple announced its new M3-powered MacBook Pro models, two of which are featured above. The M3 Pro and M3 Max laptop give you the most power, but the now entry-level M3 chip is still going to crush most laptops, and this version of the Pro will cost you significantly less. 

Gone is the always divisive Touch Bar from the M2 line, and up goes the display size to 14-inch standard.  The all-new M3 chip offers an 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, up to 24GB of unified memory, and up to 1TB of storage. In addition, you'll get up to 22 hours of battery life, which is vital for photographers on the go.

The M3 chip has fewer cores than the M3 Pro and M3 Max and you can only equip it with 1TB of storage, which might be an issue for some professional photographers.  But otherwise the cheapest MacBook Pro offers excellent battery life and the same beautiful display to view your photos. 

The best MacBook for student photographers

The 2022 MacBook Air is our favorite MacBook overall because of its fresh design, light weight, and M2 chip. The Apple M2 on the MacBook Air offers an 8-core CPU, up to 10-core GPU, and up to 24GB of unified memory. When configuring your MacBook Air, you can select 256GB, 512GB, 1TB, or 2TB of storage, and either 8-core or 10-core GPU. CPU is 8-core, regardless of your configuration.

It used to be that there were very few differences between the MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro. That's no longer the case, as the MacBook Air was significantly updated this time while the MacBook Pro was not. It offers a 13.6-inch Liquid Retina display and a 1080p FaceTime HD camera for the first time. Plus, it comes with a MagSafe charging port — just like the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models before. The MacBook Air (M2, 2022) also comes in four colors: Space Gray, silver, Starlight, and Midnight.

The MacBook Air has the perfect balance of features and affordability with the new M1 SoC, Retina display, and great software. For students, it's the one to go for. 

• ^ Back to the top

Q & A

The 16-inch MacBook Pro (late 2023) is the best for professional photographers. It offers blazing-fast internals thanks to your choice of the M3 Pro or M3 Max SoC. Both have been optimized for performance and efficiency. The model also offers up to 8TB of storage and 128GB of unified memory.

Add in the fact that you get up to 22 hours of battery life and a sharp Liquid Retina XDR display, and you'll have everything you'll need. It's the best MacBook Pro model you can currently find on the market. However, it doesn't come cheap, which is something to keep in mind.

Once you've secured this MacBook, you'll want to get some of the best cases and screen protectors to keep it looking shiny and brand new! 

If you love the look and feel of your photo or video compilations but don't have time to create them yourself, your iPhone can make them for you automatically. In fact, it's already doing so, but you have to know where to look. The Memories feature in the Photos app chooses not only images we haven't seen in a while, but also groups them together, adding music, and turning them into something more. Here's how to use it.

How to use Memories in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the For You tab.

3. Locate the Memories section and tap See All.
4. Tap on a memory that you want to view.

How to search Memories in the Photos app

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Search tab.

3. Input the search terms you're looking for to help find a particular memory.
4. Scroll down and you'll find your Memory at the bottom.

How to start a slideshow in Memories

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the For You tab.

3. Go to the Memories section and tap See All.
4. Select a memory that you want to view.

5. Tap the play button on the memory cover to start the slideshow.

Apple occasionally offers updates to iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, tvOS, and macOS as closed developer previews or public betas. While the betas contain new features, they also contain pre-release bugs that can prevent the normal use of your iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, or Mac, and are not intended for everyday use on a primary device. That's why we strongly recommend staying away from developer previews unless you need them for software development, and using the public betas with caution. If you depend on your devices, wait for the final release.

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap the For You tab.
3. Go to the Memories section and tap See All.
4. Tap a Memory to immediately start playing it.

How to customize your Memories slideshow

1. Follow the instructions for starting your slideshow above.
2. Press the pause button at the bottom.
3. Press the options icon at the top. It looks like three dots in a circle.

4. Tap on the slideshow elements you want to customize.
5. Once you've made all of your changes, tap Done to save them.

In iOS 15 and iPadOS 15, Apple added the ability to import songs from Apple Music into your Memories slideshows. Here's how to add a track:

1. Follow the instructions for starting your slideshow above.
2. Tap anywhere on the screen.
3. Tap the Music button in the bottom left corner.
4. Tap the Add Apple Music Track button (it looks like a music note with a + on it).
5. Find a song you want to use and tap it to select.
6. Tap Done.

1. Follow the instructions for changing your music above.
2. After entering the music interface, tap the Looks button in the bottom right (it looks like three overlapping circles, and is next to the Add Music Track button).
3. Select the Memory Look you want to use.
4. Tap Done.

How to save a Memories slideshow

1. Make sure that you've made all of the changes that you want to a Memories slideshow using the method above.
2. Tap on the Share button in the top right corner.
3. Tap on Save Video from the Share Sheet, or any other sharing method you prefer.

4. The Photos app will automatically export your video. You'll find it in the Library tab of the Photos app.

How to delete certain photos from a Memories slideshow

1. Follow steps 1-3 in the customizing a Memories slideshow section.
2. Tap on Manage Photos in the Slideshow Edit Menu.
3. Scrub through the photos and video timeline until you find a photo that you don't want.
4. Deselect any selected photos from the slideshow that you do not wish to be included.
5. Tap Done to save your changes.

1. Follow the instructions for starting your slideshow.
2. Tap the screen again to bring up the customization options.
3. Tap the Photos button in the bottom right (it looks like six squares).
4. Long-press on a photo to bring up a contextual menu.
5. Select Hide from Memory. The photo will no longer appear in the slideshow.

How to favorite a Memories slideshow

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Go to the For You tab.

3. Under Memories, tap See All.
4. Tap on a Memory you want to view.

5. Tap on the options menu. That's the "..." button in the top right corner.
6. Select Add to Favorite Memories.

7. Go back to the All Memories screen.
8. Tap Favorites in the top right corner to check out your Favorite memories.

How to delete a Memory slideshow

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Go to the For You section.

3. Under Memories, tap See All.

4. Tap on the options menu. That's the "..." button in the top right corner.
5. Select Delete Memory.

6. Tap Delete Memory.

Enjoy new Memories from here on out

Now that you know how to find and manage Memories on your iPhone, be sure to check back often to see what's new. The iPhone will continually create new Memories based on your photo and video activity, especially after anything it perceives might be an important occasion. It's a fun way to save time by customizing, saving, and sharing important Memories whenever they come up.

Updated June 2022: Updated for latest version of iOS.

Apple's iCloud service includes iCloud Photos, a free service Apple offers for the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and PC. It lets you create shared albums that your friends, family, and co-workers can access, comment upon, and even add their own images and video. By default, iCloud Photos uses iCloud accounts, but you can also create a private iCloud.com website for non-iCloud users to view photos and video.

Why use a shared album instead of a service like Instagram or Facebook? iCloud's albums allow for greater privacy than both services — iCloud Photos is encrypted, and your activities are only shared with the people you've invited to the group instead of the general public.

How to enable iCloud Photo Sharing

When you enable iCloud Photo Sharing on your best Mac or smart device, you can create and share albums with other people that also have an iCloud account. You can also be invited to share someone else's album after you've enabled it.

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Scroll down and tap Photos.
3. Toggle the Shared Albums switch on.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Select Photos from the app menu in the upper left corner.
3. Select Preferences from the drop-down menu.
4. Select the iCloud tab.
5. Tick the box for iCloud Photos.
6. Tick the box for Shared Albums.

1. On your PC, open the Start Menu and navigate to the iCloud folder.
2. Open the iCloud application.
3. In the box that pops up, click on the Options button next to Photos.

4. Check the box labeled iCloud Photos to enable this option.

How to disable iCloud Photos

Want to turn off iCloud's photo-sharing features? You need only switch off the option in settings.

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Scroll down and tap Photos.
3. Toggle the Shared Albums switch off.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Select Photos from the app menu in the upper left corner.
3. Select Preferences from the drop-down menu.
4. Select the iCloud tab.
5. Untick the box for Shared Albums.

1. On your PC, open the Start Menu and navigate to the iCloud folder.
2. Open the iCloud application.
3. In the box that pops up, click on the Options button next to Photos.
4. Uncheck the box labeled iCloud Photos.

Navigating iCloud Photos

There are a lot of ways you can organize, view, and interact with shared albums in iCloud Photos. You can view and create shared photo albums, but you can also interact with them in a social media-like way by liking, commenting, and adding subscribers as well.

Now you're all set!

iCloud Photos is easy to use once you have it enabled on your iPhone, iPad, or computer. Keep in mind it can take a while for the photos on your devices to sync to the cloud, so don't be alarmed if some content doesn't show up right away. Once everything is synced up, your library will look the same across all devices.

Updated December 2022: Updated to reflect the latest on iCloud Photos.

If you've enabled iCloud Photos on your iPhone or iPad, you may have noticed that some of your content isn't showing up. I first noticed this a few days ago while searching for a video I know I had taken on my iPhone a few days prior. For some reason, it wasn't showing up on my iPad, which also has iCloud Photos enabled. Digging deeper, some photos that I actually took on my iPhone were also missing. As it turns out, there are a few steps you can take to get content syncing properly to and from iCloud Photos.

What happened to my albums after turning on iCloud Photos?

After you turn on iCloud Photos in your iPhone's settings panel, you may notice that some albums seem to have disappeared and others just suddenly appear in the Photos app. Don't worry! Your photos and videos are still there, but iCloud Photos organizes them a little differently. For example, the photos that were in your My Photo Stream and Camera Roll albums can now be found in the All Photos album:

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Photos on the bottom left.
3. Select the All Photos view.
4. All of your photos and videos are organized here according to date.

If you think that some photos and videos are still missing, there are additional steps you can take to sync them properly.

How to check your Recently Deleted folder

The most common reason why some photos and videos disappear from iCloud Photos is that they were accidentally deleted. You can check this easily:

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums.
3. Scroll down and tap Recently Deleted.

4. If you find any photo or video that was unintentionally deleted, simply tap it and then tap Recover.
5. Tap Recover one more time to confirm.

Any recovered images will be returned to the All Photos album.

How to sign in with the same Apple ID on all devices

If you have different devices that are synced with different Apple IDs, then your photos and videos will not sync on all devices with iCloud Photos. Make sure they are all signed on with the same Apple ID for content to sync properly between devices with iCloud Photos. To check Apple ID, do the following:

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Your name right at the top, where it also says Apple ID, iCloud, iTunes, and App Store.
3. The name and email associated with your Apple ID will display at the top. Make sure this is the same on all devices.

If you have multiple devices signed in with different Apple IDs, you'll need to sign out and sign in with the same Apple ID across all devices:

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Your name right at the top, where it also says Apple ID, iCloud, iTunes, and App Store.
3. Scroll all the way down and tap Sign Out.
4. Confirm by tapping Sign Out again.

5. Now scroll back up and tap Sign in to your iPhone.
6. Enter the same Apple ID email and password you use on your other devices and tap Next.

Once all devices are signed in to the same Apple ID, the same iCloud Photos content will sync across each device. It may take a while for everything to sync, so be patient. Sometimes it's better to step away and check again the next day to make sure everything has synced properly.

How to check your iCloud storage limit

If your iCloud Storage limit has been exceeded, then photos and videos will stop syncing across devices, even if iCloud Photos is on. You can check if the storage limit has been reached:

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Your name right at the top, where it also says Apple ID, iCloud, iTunes, and App Store.

3. Tap iCloud
4. Here you can see how much iCloud storage has been used.

If your iCloud storage limit has been reached, your photos and videos will no longer sync properly. In this situation, you can either manage your storage usage to make more space, or upgrade your iCloud storage plan.

How to unhide photos and videos

If photos or videos get hidden from the All Photos view, you'll only be able to see them if you go to the Hidden folder, rather than iCloud Photos. Here's how:

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums
3. Scroll down and tap Hidden under Other Albums.

4. To unhide a photo or video, tap Select.
5. Tap the Share icon in the bottom left.
6. Scroll down and tap Unhide.

This will unhide photos and videos across all devices.

All fixed!

These steps should help resolve any issues you have with iCloud Photos. For more on the iCloud Photos system in general, consult our ultimate guide on everything iCloud Photo. Once you have it mastered, your entire photo management experience will be streamlined and secure.

Updated May 2022: These are still the accurate steps for troubleshooting iCloud Photo Library.

Visual Look Up uses machine learning and intelligence to give users information on various objects, places, animals, flowers and plants, and more in their pictures in the Photos app. It's a really useful tool that comes in handy when you want information instantly. 

The feature helps people learn more about what they have photographed and is particularly handy when you don't know what insect, bird, object you've found in the wild. Here's how to use Visual Look Up on iPhone and iPad.

What devices can use Visual Look Up?

First thing's first — only some devices are able to use the Visual Look Up feature. The one requirement for Visual Look Up is that the device needs to have at least an A12 Bionic chip, which eliminates older models. Here is the full list of compatible A12 (and later) devices:

• iPhone (XS and later)
• iPad (8th generation and later)
• iPad Air (3rd generation and later)
• iPad mini (5th generation and later)
• iPad Pro (2018 and later)

If you are using an older model that is not listed, then you may want to consider upgrading to the best iPhone and best new iPad — Visual Look Up is a very nice feature to have.

How to use Visual Look Up in iOS

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Look for a photo that has sparkly stars on the "i" button.
3. Tap the "i" button when it has the sparkly stars on it.

3. While this brings up the information panel, you should also see a Visual Look Up button on the image itself. This button will have a different icon on it, depending on what it is. For example, if it is an animal, you'll see a paw print.
4. Tap the Visual Look Up button.
5. It should bring up results using Siri Knowledge, and you can browse for similar results on the web.

Visual Look Up will need to go through all of your photos to process and index the results. If you have a lot of photos, this may take a while.

Another trick your iPhone has up its sleeve, is the ability to read text via the camera or off of photos — it's called Live Text. Learning how to use Live Text can be a life-changer as it makes photos and videos useful as note-taking tools. And, if you want to have some fun the ability to lift subjects from a photo and use them as stickers is fantastic!

If you have an iPhone, then you probably use it a lot for taking photos. After all, no matter which model you have, the iPhone always has a pretty great camera, and it's always there for those spontaneous moments. Over time, this means you have a lot of photos. But what if you want to edit a bunch of them on your Mac, rather than your iPhone or iPad, so that they look the absolute best they can? You need to get them over from your iPhone to your Mac somehow. Fortunately, there are a few ways to go about this.

Whether you're using the iPhone SE or the iPhone 13 Pro, here's how to transfer photos from your favorite iPhone right to your best Mac.

Use iCloud Photo Library

One of the easiest methods to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Mac, with no cables required, is to turn on iCloud Photos. When this is enabled, you should be able to access all of the photos and videos that you have across all of your devices — including the best iPad, iPhone, and Mac.

However, you will need to have enough storage space in your iCloud account, which you may not have. Apple provides 5GB of free space for every iCloud account, which is like nothing these days. If you want to use iCloud Photos, you may need to consider which iCloud storage plan you should get, which start at $0.99 a month for 50GB, $2.99 for 200GB, or you can get 2TB for $9.99 a month. There are also Apple One bundles, which get you iCloud storage on top of other Apple services like Apple Arcade, Apple News+, Apple Fitness, and more.

The 2TB option can also be shared with up to six others through Family Sharing. For most individuals, the 200GB should suffice. However, you should keep in mind that this iCloud storage is not just for iCloud Photos — it's for everything you store in iCloud, including iCloud backups, which can take up quite a bit of space.

To use iCloud Photos for importing your photos over to your Mac from your iPhone, you'll first need to make sure that all of your devices have iCloud Photos enabled.

1. Launch Settings on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Scroll down and tap on Photos.
3. Tap the toggle for iCloud Photos to ON (green).

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click Photos in the upper left corner of the menu bar.
3. Click Preferences (you can also easily access the Preferences by pressing cmd and , on your keyboard).
4. Click on the iCloud tab.
5. Click the checkbox on iCloud Photos to turn it on.

Once iCloud Photos is enabled on all of the devices you want to use it on, your images should sync automatically across everything. However, it may take up to 24 hours after turning it on for everything to get synced over, so you'll have to be patient. After that, though, everything should be rather seamless when it comes down to how to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Mac.

Import via the Photos app on Mac

If you use the Photos app on your Mac to manage your photos and edit them, but you don't want to use iCloud Photos, then you'll need to manually plug your phone in and import it the old fashioned way. Here's how.

1. Connect your iPhone or iPad to your Mac via a USB cable.
2. Open the Photos app on your Mac.
3. The Photos app should automatically be on the Import screen with all photos and videos on the connected device. If not, just click on the device name in the sidebar.
4. Select the photos you want to import.
5. Click Import Selected. If you did not select photos, click Import All New Photos.

6. Photos app will begin the process. Once it's completed, you can disconnect your iPhone or iPad from your Mac.

Before iCloud Photos was a thing, this was probably the best and most straightforward way on how to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Mac.

Transfer the photos with AirDrop

Don't use the Photos app on Mac? No problem. Another quick way on how to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Mac is to utilize AirDrop. With AirDrop, you're using Bluetooth Low Energy to basically create a point-to-point WiFi network that can transfer data between two Apple devices, such as an iPhone and a Mac, an iPhone to another iPhone, an iPhone to an iPad — you get the idea. AirDrop is fast, power-efficient, and secure.

It's also incredibly easy to use!

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find the photos and videos that you want to send to your Mac. You can do it for individual images or a batch of multiple photos.
3. Tap the Share button in the bottom right corner.

4. Tap AirDrop.
5. Select the Mac device that you want to send the images to.

6. On your Mac, the AirDropped image should appear in a Finder window.

If you use AirDrop enough, it will begin to show up as the first choice in the top row of sharing options. You can just tap it to send to your most frequently AirDropped device, which may be your Mac.

I honestly use AirDrop every day to complete work here at iMore. It's the fastest way to for me to get iPhone and iPad screenshots, product review photos, and more, without having to deal with iCloud Photos or the Photos app on Mac.

Utilize the Files app

If you want to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Mac, but don't want to use iCloud Photos and Photos on Mac, then you could use the Files app instead. Importing a file into the Files app on your iPhone means you can access that photo or video file from your Mac via iCloud Drive, or even another third-party syncing service, such as Dropbox or Google Drive.

If you prefer to use a third-party service, such as Dropbox, you'll need to turn that on first.

1. Launch the Files app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Browse tab.
3. Tap the "..." button in the upper right corner.

4. Tap Edit.
5. Under Locations, tap the toggle for the third-party service or app you want to enable.
6. Tap Done.

Now that your service or app is enabled in the Files app, you should be able to browse all of your stored files directly, without having to use a separate app.

Of course, third-party services like Dropbox also have standalone apps that can handle your Camera Roll uploads automatically as well.

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find the photos and videos that you want to send to Files.
3. Tap the Share button.

4. Scroll down and tap Save to Files.
5. If you have multiple locations saved, choose the location you want to save to.
6. Tap Save.

Once you have imported your photos and video to the Files app in your specified location, it should be easy to find them on your Mac.

1. Launch Finder on your Mac.
2. Click iCloud Drive in the sidebar. If you chose a different location, like Dropbox, click Dropbox in the sidebar.

3. Your photo or video should be there. It may be easier to sort by Date Added or Date Modified if you have a lot of files.

Send 'em to your Mac right from your iPhone!

While you may use your iPhone for all of your photo-taking needs, getting them on your Mac may not be so obvious. But now that we've shown you all of the different ways that you can accomplish this, it's pretty easy! Plus, there are some amazing photo editors on the Mac that help you achieve the perfect photo. And don't forget, you can transfer photos from your Mac to your iPhone as well, you know, so you can post those edited photos on Instagram.

Updated March 2022: These are still the best ways to transfer photos from your iPhone to your Mac.

Apple has a cloud-based storage service, called iCloud, that you can use to store and sync photos, documents, movies, music, and a whole lot more. You can find all of your iCloud content on any of your Apple devices using the same Apple ID, from re-downloading apps and games to watching TV shows and movies. Here's everything you need to know about iCloud on iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

How to set up, sync, back up, and restore with iCloud

The very first thing you'll need to do before you can use iCloud is set it up. This involves choosing what data you want to sync and what you want to back up. You'll also need to decide whether or not you need to buy additional iCloud storage space, which we'll help you with as well.

If you're already using iCloud on one Apple device and need to know how to get all your stuff to a new device, this is the guide for you. We will walk you through setting up a device as new, restoring from a backup, and lots more. You'll walk away feeling confident you have complete control over your iCloud data, how it's stored, and what you need to do in order to recover it.

How to use iCloud Photo Library

iCloud Photo Library is available to anyone with an iPhone or an iPad. iCloud Photo Library keeps your entire photo and video library in sync between any iPhones, iPads, and Macs you own. This is done through the Photos for iOS and Photos for Mac apps. Create an album on your iPhone, it's instantly synced to your Mac, and vice versa. iCloud Photo Library can also help you free up tremendous amounts of storage space on your best iPhone or iPad by streaming photos and videos instead of physically downloading them. A great compromise for anyone who wants the best of both worlds.

How to use iCloud Photo Sharing and My Photo Stream

iCloud Photo Sharing and My Photo Stream are both parts of the Photos app on iPhone, iPad, and Mac as well. iCloud Photo Sharing lets you create shared photo albums that friends and family can view, add to, comment on, and like. It's a great way to share photos with only a small group of people, no social network required.

My Photo Stream can automatically store your last 30 days of photos, or most recent 1,000, whichever is larger. These are then available across any device that supports Photo Stream. It doesn't store videos like iCloud Photo Library but may be enough for some people. Check out our guide to learn some of the most important differences between the two.

How to use Find My

The Find My app lets you locate any Apple devices that you may have misplaced. Things mean devices like your iPhone or Mac, but also accessories like AirTags Not only can you send an alert with a message to a device you can't find, you can also remotely wipe data from it if worse comes to worst. The best part is that if you have Find My enabled, potential thieves won't be able to turn it off without your iCloud password. We highly recommend enabling and learning everything you can about how this free service can help you protect your devices and your personal data.

How to use Family Sharing

Family Sharing lets you share iTunes and App Store purchases with other members of your household. Even better, parents can take advantage of the "Ask to Buy" feature which requires young children to request purchases. You'll get a notification and can approve or reject their request remotely. Family Sharing also adds convenient tracking features which are handy for children in the household. When they're old enough to be on their own plan, you can hand their Apple ID over to them to manage on their own.

We can walk you through how to set up child ID's, track someone's lost device in your Family Sharing group, and anything else you need to know about Apple's Family Sharing service.

How to use iTunes in the Cloud

iTunes in the Cloud lets you access, stream, and re-download content you've purchased from iTunes. This includes items from the App Store, iTunes Store, and iBookstore. If you have an Apple TV in your home, you can access all your purchased movies, tv shows, music, and more just by logging in. They'll be instantly available for streaming. And if you have Family Sharing enabled, you can also stream purchases belonging to someone else in your Family Sharing group.

How to use iCloud Music Library

iCloud Music Library lets you compare your entire library with the iTunes music catalog: If it finds the same song, it lets you stream or download it from iTunes, to any of your Apple devices, immediately or for as long as you stay a subscriber. If it doesn't find the same song, it uploads your version and lets you stream it just the same. Because your music is always available on Apple's servers, it works like a backup, making sure you don't lose your collection even if you lose your device.

How to use iCloud Keychain

iCloud Keychain tries to bring sanity to password management. If you save a password in Safari on your Mac for use later, iCloud Keychain can sync that same convenience to Safari on your iPhone or iPad. iCloud Keychain can also store credit cards, addresses, and other personal details so you can easier fill out forms when you need to. Need to generate a strong password for a new account? iCloud Keychain can do that too!

Don't forget iCloud+

When you pay for iCloud, rather than using the free version Apple offers, you'll get access to iCloud+.

Cloud+ brings with it some new features, though, namely the privacy-focused Hide My Email and Private Relay, plus enhanced HomeKit Secure Video storage. iCloud+ also comes with custom email domains for iCloud Mail accounts. So be sure to check it out, to see if it's for you.

Family Sharing is one of the best Apple iCloud services for family groups. It allows you to share storage space, purchase accounts, subscriptions, Apple Music plans, Apple Arcade and much more between multiple iCloud users. This includes managed accounts for young children. 

Besides all those benefits, Family Sharing also integrates with Shared Albums -- a free feature that provides your family with a secure shared album so you can easily share images and videos in one place. Each family member in your circle has their own separate iCloud Photo Library but they can choose to send media to the Family album, providing everyone with a communal space. It's perfect if you want to share your latest vacation snaps or photos of the kids with everyone in a secure environment.

Here's how to use iCloud Photo Sharing alongside Family Sharing. Once it's set up, you can easily access the Family album on your shiny new iPhone 14 Pro, one of the best iPads, or the latest MacBook Air M2, and everything in between.

Note: Before following these steps, make sure you've enabled iCloud Shared Albums. It's not possible to use the Family album unless it's switched on. There's no need to use iCloud Photo Library to enable sharing if you prefer another syncing alternative.

How to view the Family album on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac

If you want to see which of your family members have already added to the album, you'll need to open the Shared section of your Photos app. That's also how you view the Family album. Here's what to do.

1. Open the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Albums tab.
3. After scrolling down to Shared Albums, tap the Family album. (If you can't see the album, tap See All and browse through the shared albums until you find it.)

1. Open Photos on your Mac.
2. Look under the Shared section of the Sidebar, and click Shared Albums.
3. Click the Family album.

How to add new photos or video to the Family album on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac

Adding new photos to the Family Album is pretty much as easy as adding photos or videos to any other album. If you're not sure though, here's what to do.

1. Tap the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap the Albums tab at the bottom of the screen.
3. After scrolling down to the Shared Albums section, tap the Family album. (If you can't see it, tap See All and browse through the shared albums until you find it.)

4. Tap the plus sign.
5. Tap the photo or photos you want to share, then tap Done in the upper right corner.
6. Type a description if you'd like to add some context, then tap Post in the pop-up window.

1. Open Photos on your Mac.
2. Click on the photos you want to share with your family members (shift-click or command-click to select multiple).
3. Click the share button on the upper right of the window. It's a box with an upward arrow.
4. Click on Shared Albums to find the right album.
5. Click Family. The images will then sync over to your family member's device near instantly, depending on everyone's internet connection.

How to remove photos or video from the Family album on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac

If you want to remove any photos or videos from the Family album, you're only a couple of clicks or taps away. All members of the group can delete content they don't want to share any more. Here's how to do so.

1. Open the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap the Albums tab to find the album.
3. Scroll down to Shared Albums and tap the Family album. (If you can't see it, tap on See All and browse through the shared albums until you find it.)

4. Tap Select in the upper right corner.
5. Tap the photo or video you wish to delete from the shared album. It won't remove it from your device -- only the shared album.

6. Tap the Trash icon in the bottom right corner of the screen.
7. Tap Delete Photos to confirm that you definitely want to delete the selected photos.

1. Open the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click on Shared Albums in the sidebar of the app.
3. Click the Family album.
4. Select the images you want to delete from the shared album.

5. Tap the Delete key on your keyboard.
6. Click Delete on screen to confirm that you want to remove the photo from the shared album. Again, this will only remove the image from the shared album, not the original on your device.

Share your favorite memories with Family Sharing

It's simple to use Family Sharing and iCloud to share your favorite moments and memories with your loved ones. More convenient than trying to set up a private Facebook or Instagram account (and liaising with who shares what), you get all the benefits of the security that iCloud brings with an effort-free experience for all. 

Providing everyone in your family group knows how to use their Apple devices (and why wouldn't they?), Family Sharing means they can figure things out just as easily as if they were saving to their regular Camera Roll.

You also get the benefits of receiving a notification any time someone shares a new photo or video, which can make updates fairly exciting when there's lots going on in your circle.

Several years ago, Apple added support for extensions throughout iOS, which opens up a whole new world of possibilities with the best apps on your favorite iPhone or iPad. For example, extensions let you send a snippet of text directly to your preferred calendar or to-do app, and you can even use the features of your photo editing app of choice right in the Photos app. That's right — you don't even need to launch the app itself to make non-destructive edits to your best photos.

But you may be wondering how you access these extensions in the Photos app. Don't worry, we'll show you how to make use of these extensions in the Photos app on your best iPhone and iPad right here!

How to turn on photo and video extensions in the Photos app

To use a photo or video extension, you'll have to download an app that makes use of the extensions feature. Some of our favorites include Camera+ 2, Darkroom, Pixelmator, and more.

With iOS 13 and later, apps with a Photos app extension are turned on automatically, so you don't have to manually turn it on like before. However, you can choose Favorites, which bump those extensions to the top of the list. Here's how to do that:

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the photo or video that you want to edit.
3. Tap Edit in the upper right corner.

4. Tap the "..." button in the upper right corner.
5. Tap on More in the menu.

6. Tap Edit.
7. Tap the green + button on the extensions you want to Favorite, and you can rearrange the order that they appear by dragging the handle on the right.

How to access and use photo and video extensions in the Photos app

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the photo or video that you want to edit.
3. Tap Edit.

4. Tap the "..." button.
5. Tap on the extension that you want to use.
6. Make your edits.
7. Tap Done to save your changes.

Edit your pics like a pro right in Photos!

Most photo editing apps should feature an extension, though it is up to the developers, so some may not be supported. But if your app is, then you'll be able to use that app's particular feature set to make edits directly in the Photos app, without having to jump between multiple apps. It's a convenient feature, and the best part is that all of your edits are non-destructive. This means you can revert any changes if you decide you don't like it.

So if you have a great iPhone, such as the iPhone 13 Pro, then make use of these photo editing app extensions as much as possible. Your pictures will look even more amazing.

Updated March 2022: These are still the current steps for using photo and video extensions in the Photos app in iOS 15.

When you use your digital camera to take amazing photos, you're going to want to import those photos onto your Mac to edit, share, and store them. You can even set up the Photos app on Mac to import photos automatically from that specific device. In macOS Monterey, you can also select which album you want those photos to go to. If you're trying to import a bunch of pictures from a specific event, you can also create a brand new folder and move them directly to it for better organization.

Here's everything you need to know about how to import photos from your best digital camera to your Mac.

How to select a folder to add new photos from your digital camera in the Photos app on Mac

In macOS Monterey, after you prepare your digital camera to import to the Photos app, here's how to select a specific folder to relocate to.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac if it doesn't open automatically.
2. Click on your digital camera from the sidebar if it isn't already selected.

3. Select the photos you want to import to a specific folder.
4. Click on Library at the top of the Photos app window.
5. Select the folder you want to import the selected pictures directly to.

The pictures will be imported directly to the folder you selected. If you want to import multiple photos to different folders, follow the steps above and select which photos you want to import to each folder until you've imported them all.

How to create a new folder to import photos from your camera to Mac with the Photos app

If you're just about to dump all of your vacation photos into the Photos app on your Mac but haven't created a dedicated folder for it yet, no problem; you can do so right before importing.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac if it doesn't open automatically.
2. Click on your digital camera from the sidebar if it isn't already selected.

3. Select the photos you want to import to the newly created folder.
4. Click on Library at the top of the Photos app window.
5. Click on New Album.

6. Enter an album name.
7. Click on OK.

The pictures will be imported directly to the folder you created. If you want to import multiple photos to different folders, follow the steps above and create new folders for each until you've imported them all.

How to find the photos you've just added to a folder in the Photos app on Mac

After you've created or selected a specific folder to import your photos to, you can find them under My Albums.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click on My Albums in the sidebar.
3. Double-click on the Album.

There they are!

Where your pictures go if you don't select a specific folder to import photos from your camera to Mac with the Photos app

If you don't select a folder to import your photos to, you can still find them easily. They will always be delivered to your Photos library (it's the one right at the top of the sidebar) whether you send them to a specific folder or not. You can also find them in your Imports section, where you will find all of the photos that you have imported from your camera to Mac (unless you've deleted them).

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click on Imports.

You can filter your imported content by favorited, edited, only photos, only videos, or keyword (if you've tagged your photos).

Click on Showing in the upper left and select a filter.

Transfer those photos to your iPhone

Now that you know how to import photos to the location you what, learning how to transfer photos from your Mac to your iPhone is an excellent way to post your favorite shots to your social media accounts. Happy shooting!

Updated March 2022: Updated for the latest version of macOS Monterey.

When you have the best iPhone, it's super easy to take some amazing photos whenever the opportunity pops up. And over time, you'll end up with so many great pictures that it would be a shame to not share and print them out. Thankfully, you can do all of that right on your iPhone or iPad, thanks to iOS and the Photos app.

Here's everything you need to know about how to print and share from the Photos app on your favorite iPhone and iPad.

How to share individual photos from the Photos app on iPhone

Is there one particular photo that you absolutely love and know a family member or friend would greatly appreciate it too? Then you should share it with them! Here's how to share a single image on your iPhone and iPad through the Photos app.

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Locate the photo or video that you want to share.
3. Tap the photo or video to view it.

4. Tap the Share button in the bottom left corner.
5. Tap the share method that you prefer.

The Share Sheet has three sections, represented by rows. The first row has your frequently contacted contacts, including those from apps like Facebook Messenger and even Discord. The second contains your app extensions, allowing you to share your image directly through an app that you've installed on your device. The third section, which is more like a list, has all of the action extensions, which let you do other things in the Photos app, such as adding to an album or setting an image as a wallpaper.

You can customize what appears in the actions extension section by scrolling all the way to the bottom and tapping Edit Actions. From here, you can add or remove actions as you see fit.

How to share multiple photos from the Photos app on iPhone

Have more than one photo or video that you want to share? No problem! Just like an individual image, you can share multiple photos and videos in just a few taps.

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap the Albums tab if you aren't already there.
3. Tap on the album that has the media you want to share.
4. Tap Select in the upper right corner.
5. Tap the photos and videos that you want to share.

6. Tap the Share button in the bottom left corner.
7. Tap the share method that you prefer.

How to print photos from the Photos app on iPhone

If you have a compatible AirPrint printer, then you can print your photos directly with AirPrint from your iPhone or iPad! Here's how.

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find the photo that you want to print out.

3. Tap the Share button.
4. Scroll down and tap Print. If you have a compatible printer, the Print Screen appears.
5. Tap Select Printer and select your printer.

6. Tap the + or - buttons to adjust the number of copies to print.
7. Tap Options to customize whether it's in color or black & white, as well as choose paper size.
8. Tap Print.

If you want to save some money and don't want to pay a service to print photos out all the time, you should invest in one of the best AirPrint printers and print directly at home. Just make sure you have some high-quality photo paper in stock at all times.

Share those pics!

When it comes down to how to print and share from the Photos app on iPhone, it's easy-peasy! Everything can be done in just a few taps. Just make sure that you have a good AirPrint printer if you want to print photos directly at home, without having to order them online or go into a drugstore each time for prints.

Updated February 2022: These are still the steps for sharing and printing photos in iOS 15.

Making or subscribing to a shared photo album on iCloud is just the beginning: Once you're part of a shared album with your friends, family, or co-workers, you can add comments, like photos, invite more pals into the fray, and more.

If you want the social media experience without having to plaster your images across the internet, iCloud Photo Sharing offers some great tools for it. Here's how you can like your friends' images, add new people to an existing shared album, and add comment threads to photos and videos.

How to share albums with people who don't use iCloud

Want to share vacation images and videos with someone who doesn't have an iCloud address or an Apple iPhone? Apple makes it easy for you to show your photos and clips to others by creating an unlisted iCloud.com website for your album: All you need to do is give your friend the URL.

Unlike the Photos app, Apple's website won't allow users to like or comment on your images or video, and they won't be able to upload additional images or clips to the page. That said, they can still download a copy of the images onto their devices.

Note: Only the album owner and creator can change this setting. In addition, your album won't have any sort of privacy check beyond the private URL: Anyone with the link can access your images and video.

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums at the bottom of the screen.
3. Scroll down to Shared Albums and select the album for which you want to allow anyone to view photos from a web browser via iCloud.com. If you don't see the album right away, click See All and scroll through until you see the album you want.

4. Tap People icon at the top of the screen.
5. Toggle the Public Website switch on to allow anyone with the URL access to the shared album from a web browser.

Once you've turned on the website function, you can share it with anyone by copying the album link.

1. Launch the Photos app.
2. Open the Shared album.

3. Click on the People button in the toolbar.
4. Check the box next to Public Website to allow anyone with the URL access to the shared album from a web browser.

How to add someone to a shared photo album

Want to show a new person the photos and videos you've added to an existing shared album? It only takes a few clicks.

Note: Only the album creator and owner can add new people to a shared album — make sure whoever creates the album doesn't mind adding new people over time!

1. Launch the Photos app from your Home screen.
2. Tap Albums at the bottom of your screen.

3. Scroll down to Shared Albums and tap the album you would like to access.
4. Tap People.

5. Tap Invite People...
6. Type in the name of the person you'd like to invite.

1. Launch the Photos app.
2. Open the Shared album in question.

3. Click on the People button in the toolbar.
4. Click on the box that says Invite People.
5. Add the iCloud email address of the person in question.
6. Press the Return key on your keyboard.

How to remove someone from a shared photo album

Whether you accidentally invited someone to the wrong shared album or you just don't want them to have access anymore, you can get rid of a subscriber to a shared album pretty quickly.

Note: Only the creator and owner of the shared album can change this setting.

1. Launch the Photos app from your Home screen.
2. Tap Albums at the bottom of your screen.

3. Tap the shared album you would like to access.
4. Tap People.

5. Tap the name of the person you'd like to remove.
6. Tap Remove Subscriber at the bottom of the window on your screen.

A prompt will appear, so just tap Remove again to take them out of that shared album completely. The person will no longer be able to access the shared album.

1. Launch the Photos app.
2. Open the Shared album in question.
3. Click on the People button in the toolbar.

4. Click on arrow next to the subscriber you wish to remove.
5. Press Remove Subscriber.

How to let other people add photos and video to your shared photo album

iCloud's photo sharing service isn't just a one-way trip: You can create collaborative shared albums so that everyone can contribute. Whether you want to collectively share vacation photos with your family or are collaborating with work friends, everyone can upload to the same shared album. Here's how.

Note: Only the creator and owner of the shared album can change this setting.

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums at the bottom of the screen.
3. Scroll down to Shared Albums and select the album. If you don't see the album right away, click See All and scroll through until you see the album you want.

4. Tap People icon at the top of the screen.
5. Toggle the switch Subscribers can Post on to allow others to add their photos to your shared Photo Stream.

1. Launch the Photos app.
2. Open the Shared album.
3. 1. Click on the People button in the toolbar.

4. Check the box next to Subscribers Can Post to allow anyone to contribute to the album.

How to like or comment on photos or videos in a shared photo album

Turn iCloud into your own private social network with its liking and commenting features: When you open a photo or video in a shared album, you'll be able to like and comment on them, just as you would on a service like Facebook or Instagram. It's just more private.

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums at the bottom of the screen.
3. Scroll down to Shared Albums and select the album. If you don't see the album right away, click See All and scroll through until you see the album you want.

4. Select a photo.
5. Tap Like in the bottom right corner to like the photo.
6. Tap Add a comment in the bottom middle to add a comment.

You can also hide all comments in a shared Photo Stream by tapping Hide Comments under a photo that has a comment attached to it.

1. Launch the Photos app.
2. Open the Shared album.
3. Select a photo or video you wish to like or comment on.
4. Press the Speech Bubble icon in the lower-left corner to add a like or comment.
5. Press the smiley face to Like the post.
6. Tap the Add a comment field to add your comment.

How to disable notifications for a shared photo album

If people are frequently adding images to or liking photos in a shared photo album over a short period of time, you might not want to repeatedly get notifications. Here's how to shut off notifications for a single album.

1. Launch the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums at the bottom of the screen.
3. Scroll down to Shared Albums and select the album for which you want to allow anyone to view photos from a web browser via iCloud.com. If you don't see the album right away, click See All and scroll through until you see the album you want.

4. Tap on the shared album you'd like to stop notifications for.
5. Tap on People.
6. Turn Off the option for Notifications.

1. Launch the Photos app.
2. Open the Shared album.
3. Click on the People button in the toolbar.

4. Un-check the box next to Notifications to turn off notifications for this album.

How to disable all shared photo album notifications

Don't want to see notifications for any Photos-related content? You can shut off these notifications entirely by adjusting your settings.

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on Notifications.

3. Tap Photos.
4. Turn Off the types of notifications you don't want to receive. That can be badges, sounds, banners, or other options. You can also disable Photos app notifications completely by using the first toggle.

1. Open the System Preferences app.
2. Go to the Notifications tab.
3. Select the Photos notifications pane.
4. Turn off all notification settings for Photos.

Ready to roll

With all of these easy-to-follow steps, you'll be connecting with family and friends in your shared albums in no time. Avoid all the stress and hassle of social media with this fun and convenient feature.

Updated February 2022: Updated to a new format and replaced outdated screenshots.

No matter who you are, everyone loves to take pictures. These photos are memories that we want to preserve for a lifetime, or they can even be artistic ways that we express ourselves and want to show off around the home. This is why we like to get photos printed out, turned into books, turned into cards for special occasions, or even put them on mugs and other accessories.

Apple used to offer their own in-house photo printing service with its Photos app, but that was discontinued sometime in 2018. While Photos for Mac still has the option to get photo prints, it must be done through a third-party extension that you can get in the Mac App Store.

• How to set up and start using Photos on your Mac

Let's go through the new way of getting photos printed on your Mac.

• How to install a Photo Extension for Photos on Mac
• How to use a Photo Extension to print photos from Mac
• My personal method for photo printing from my Mac

How to install a Photo Extension for Photos on Mac

1. Launch Photos on your Mac.
2. Select one or more photos that you want to print.

3. Click File in the menu bar, or right click to bring up a menu.
4. Hover over Create, then select what you want to print.
   • Options include: Book, Calendar, Card, Wall Decor, Prints, Slideshow, and Other.
5. Click App Store to go straight to available apps that offer Photo Extensions.

6. Click Get on an app to download it.

You are able to download as many apps as you want or need and use the extension with Photos. These apps will simply appear in the list of apps available when you select the Create option next time.

How to use a Photos Extension to print photos from Mac

Once you have some apps installed that support Photos Extensions, it's easy to use them.

1. Launch Photos on your Mac.
2. Select one or more photos that you want to print.

3. Click File in the menu bar, or right click on the selected photo to bring up the menu.
4. Hover the cursor over Create, then select what you want to print.
5. Click the app you want to use.

6. Follow the on-screen instructions for that particular app to complete your photo print.

You can also click on the App Store option from the Create menu to once again bring up the section in the App Store with available Photo Extensions apps if you want to try out more.

My personal method for photo printing from my Mac

I take a lot of photos with my iPhones. Whenever I'm out and about, I end up taking photos whenever I can if it's something interesting, or just those moments with friends and family that I want to remember. I usually just use those photos in my Day One journal entries, but sometimes there are significant life events that deserve something more. Here's how I get my important photos printed from my Mac.

Currently, I use a combination of Dropbox and iCloud Photo Stream for keeping backups of my iPhone photos on my Macs.

I like Photo Stream because it's automatic and fairly seamless, and I use this over iCloud Photos because I still have albums on my iPhone that were synced from my Mac, and I don't want to remove those. Photo Stream lets me access my photos from the last 30 days, which is fine for me.

My permanent photo backup solution, which I use as a failsafe in case something goes wrong with Photo Stream, is Dropbox. Sometimes I end up forgetting to upload my photos for a few days, but I try to launch Dropbox at least once a day so my photos automatically upload to my 2TB Dropbox Plus account. I have years of photos in my Dropbox, so I can always browse it for what I need.

For my wedding last year, I was given digital copies through Google Drive. I saved all of the photos to my hard drive, and then uploaded them into Dropbox in appropriately labeled folders.

When I need to get these photos into Photos on Mac, I simply import them from their source folder.

• How to import images and folders into Photos

As I said, I have a ton of photos. When they end up in Photos on Mac, it's kind of a big mess. I'll have to go through each Day to see what happened or go through a ton of photos in a folder, which I may not want all of them printed.

When I go through my pictures in Photos, I think about what I want to be printed. Whether it's just prints, or a photo book, or something I want to send my mom for the holidays, I think the photos I choose should tell a kind of story. Or just look good. I mean, why else would anyone want to print out photos?

To make it easier, I select the photos I want to print and create a new album for them. I label this album with what I want to do, such as "Wedding Book," "Family Prints," "Christmas Cards," etc. That way, these photos are already set aside, and I can quickly select them for printing.

For my wedding, I wanted to have my favorite wedding photos arranged in a book to tell the story. While there are plenty of photo printing services out there, for this I chose to use Motif.

With Motif, it's easy to make a photo book in minutes. Just select your photos, then choose the size and format (hardcover or softcover) of your book. Then Motif loads up your photos in print-ready resolution, and you're off! As you pick a theme, it will give you some sample pages underneath the theme selector. If you want to go the easy route, just select Autoflow Book. With Autoflow, Motif goes through and picks out your best images and removes duplicates. You can always go back and add more photos, reduce the number of pages, and Motif will do all the heavy lifting for you.

If you want to have complete control, select Don't Autoflow. You'll then be able to design each page by choosing what photos should be shown, and you can add text to tell your story. Each page's layout can be changed if you aren't satisfied with it, you can add text along the bottom, or increase the size of a photo space if needed.

Personally, I like to put my photos in my book in chronological order. This way, it tells the story I want it to tell. I go with Don't Autoflow and it may take a while to get everything in the place I want it to be, but the result is my own creation, and it's well worth the time and effort. Motif is pretty easy to work with, as far as dragging photos around, resizing, swapping, etc. It also saves your work every few moments, so your work is safe.

Source: iMore

If I am looking for individual photo prints, I prefer using Shutterfly, as I've used them before for several projects. With Shutterfly, you're able to choose the size and finish, put a message on the back of all prints, and select how many you want. They start at $0.12 for 4x6 and go up to $12.74 for a 12x36 print. The prices are decent, and there are often promo codes and deals. Shutterfly is also great for putting your photos on other items, such as travel mugs, totes, cards, canvas, ornaments, and pretty much anything else you can think of.

For designing things like mugs and totes, I like to pick out photos that hold a special meaning to me, or would just look good on some merch. Shutterfly's drag-and-drop interface on the web is intuitive and easy to use.

Personalize and print

While Apple may not be doing the printing themselves anymore, they made it easy to work with third-party photo printing services directly in the Photos app on Mac. Some (like Motif) are integrated directly into Photos, and others (Shutterfly) will need you to go to the website to complete your order, but it's all a seamless process.

Are you using a Photo Extension to print out your photos from Mac? What service do you like using? Let us know in the comments.

The Photos app on Mac is one of the most popular features of macOS Monterey. It's here where your cherished memories are kept in image and video formats. When the time comes, you can move your photos from one Mac to the other. How you do this depends on whether you're using iCloud Photos. The steps below work on all of the best Macs.

Transferring using AirDrop

The quickest way to transfer a small number of photos or videos from the Photos app to another Mac is by using AirDrop. This assumes both machines are close enough together to use Bluetooth LE.

To get started:

1. Open the Photos app on your Mac from either the Applications folder or Mac Dock.
2. Choose the photos you wish to send to a new Mac.

3. Click on the Share Sheet icon at the top right.
4. Select AirDrop from the pull-down menu.
5. Confirm the transfer on the other Mac.

Using Mac Migration Assistant

If you want to transfer your entire Photos library from one Mac to other, you can do so using the Mac Migration Assistant.

Before starting, be sure both machines meet the following requirements:

1. Upgrade both Macs to the latest macOS version.
2. Make sure both machines are on the same Wi-Fi network.
3. On your old Mac, choose the Apple menu at the top left.

4. Select System Preferences from the pull-down menu.
5. Click Sharing.
6. Make sure that a name appears in the Computer Name field.

7. Follow the the Mac Migration Assistant directions.

With iCloud Photos

You will find the easiest way to transfer photos from one Mac to another is when using iCloud Photos. During the Mac setup process, you're asked to sign in to your Apple ID. When you do, the Mac will automatically sync with your iCloud content.

To confirm iCloud Photos are synced:

1. On your new Mac, choose the Apple menu at the top left.
2. Select System Preferences from the pull-down menu.
3. Click Apple ID at the top.

4. Click iCloud on the left side.
5. If necessary, check the Photos box on the right. Once checked, the Mac will begin syncing your photos from iCloud.

It's always a good idea to delete content you no longer need before you move your photos from one Mac to another from the Photos app. Yes, this can be a tedious process, depending on how many images you have. However, it's always nice to start fresh on a new Mac. A smaller Photos library also means it's that much quicker to transfer the content.

Regardless, enjoy your new Mac!

What you need to know

• Security research firm Corellium is launching a new Open Security Initiative.
• It will support independent public research into mobile privacy and security.
• Apple's new CSAM scanning of iCloud Photos is one of its first targets.

Security research firm Corellium has launched a new Open Security Initiative that will examine the security and privacy of Apple's new Child Safety measures as one of its first targets.

The company announced the new initiative to celebrate the firm's fourth birthday stating its new Corellium Open Security Initiative "will support independent public research into the security and privacy of mobile applications and devices through a series of awards and access to the Corellium platform."

From the post:

Its first proposed investigation will be examining Apple's new Child Sexual Abuse Material detection system on iCloud photos:

Corellium notes that Apple "has encouraged the independent security research community to validate and verify its security claims", Craig Federighi telling the Wall Street Journal last week that changes to the scope of its CSAM detection system could be spotted by security researchers. Corellium said it applauded Apple's "commitment to holding itself accountable by third-party researchers" and stated its platform was "uniquely capable of supporting researchers in that effort.

You can read the full announcement, including details about Corellium's initiative, how to enter, and prizes on offer here.

Apple's recent CSAM announcement has drawn ire from some security and privacy experts who worry the technology is intrusive, or could one day be used by governments to monitor citizens. Corellium's announcement comes less than one week after it emerged Apple had settled a major lawsuit against the company over the very iOS virtualization software it says can now aid security researchers.

What you need to know

• Apple has released a new document further detailing the security implications of its CSAM detection plans.
• Apple will publish details of the encrypted CSAM hash database that will be on all iPhones and iPads.
• Security researchers will be able to inspect the database to confirm its validity

Apple today released a new document that it hopes will go some way to allaying fears surrounding the security of its new CSAM detection system. The document carries the lofty title of "Security Threat Model Review of Apple's Child Safety Features" and is available on Apple's website.

In the document, Apple explains that it will publish a further Knowledge Base article that will contain the root hash of the encrypted CSAM hash database that will itself be included in all versions of iOS and iPadOS. The theory is that security researchers will be able to compare the database on their devices with the one on Apple's servers, ensuring that it hasn't been meddled with in any way. That's just one of the methods Apple will now employ to ensure the database of CSAM being checked is legitimate.

Apple also says that the approach will allow third-party technical audits of its system, including the encrypted CSAM database.

In a media briefing, Apple further confirmed that the CSAM threshold at which photos will be flagged for manual review is 30. That means an iCloud account will need to have 30 pieces of CSAM content discovered before a manual review takes place. Apple says that the number was never intended to be kept private because security researchers would have been able to discover it regardless. It's also thought that while some may find the number 30 high, it's still very likely much lower than the number of images likely to be found in an offender's library.

The full document can be read on Apple's website and may go some way to making people more comfortable with the new CSAM detection system. Apple was also keen to point out that the current dialog surrounding the system is something that was built into the feature's timeline.

What you need to know

• Apple has confirmed that photos already uploaded to iCloud will also be checked against CSAM hashes when the feature goes live this fall.
• Existing photos will be checked over time, although it isn't clear how long it will take.

Apple has confirmed that its controversial new CSAM detection system will check for known child abuse imagery in any image that is already in iCloud — not just new images as they are uploaded.

During media briefings aimed at clarifying how the new CSAM system works, Apple confirmed that any photo already in iCloud will be checked against known CSAM hashes over time, although it isn't clear how long that time will be. The confirmation comes as some wondered whether the checks would only be carried out against new images as they were uploaded to iCloud Photos.

Apple recently published a new CSAM FAQ in an attempt to allay fears that the child abuse checking system could be used by governments and outer agencies in any nefarious ways. Apple maintains that isn't possible, saying that it will refuse any demands to tweak CSAM hash checking so it can also check for other things — including propaganda, anty-government memes, and more.

iMore has also published a CSAM FAQ to help clear matters up and it's worth a read for anyone who continues to be confused or have concerns about the system and its intentions.

The CSAM functionality will be made live in the United States alone once iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 launch this fall, likely alongside the new iPhone 13 lineup.

What you need to know

• A digital rights organization has warned of the issues with Apple's new safety measures.
• It says the company has created a backdoor into its data storage and messaging system.

Digital rights organization EFF has warned of potential issues surrounding Apple's recently-announced plans to scan iCloud photos for images of Child Sexual Abuse Material.

The organization stated:

Whilst the foundation says child exploitation is a "serious problem", it says Apple is bending its privacy stance on the matter, and that it has created a backdoor to user privacy:

The article misunderstands some of the issues at play, stating falsely that Apple "is planning to install" new features on every Apple device. However, it notes that Apple's new measures take place on the device and says:

The company says that "people have the right to communicate privately without backdoors or censorship" even as minors, and that Apple should not follow through with its plans. You can read the full report here.

Apple recently announced new measures that will include scanning for photos uploaded to iCloud to check for the hashes of known images depicting child abuse against an existing database, plans which have been met with very mixed reactions and have been vocally criticized by some security experts and privacy advocates, including Edward Snowden.

What you need to know

• Apple's new on-device CSAM checks are only run on photos that are to be uploaded to iCloud Photos.
• Photos aren't checked on devices with iCloud Photos disabled.
• Apple also confirmed that it cannot check photos that are inside iCloud backups

Apple announced new on-device CSAM detection techniques yesterday as part of its new Child Safety measures, and there has been a lot of confusion over what the feature can and cannot do. Contrary to what some people believe, Apple cannot check images when users have iCloud Photos disabled.

Apple's confirmation of the new CSAM change did attempt to make this clear, but perhaps didn't make as good a job of it as it could. With millions upon millions of iPhone users around the world, it's to be expected that some could be confused.

The key part there is the iCloud Photos bit because CSAM checks will only be carried out on devices that have that feature enabled. Any device with it disabled will not have its images checked. That's also a fact that MacRumors had confirmed, too.

Something else that's been confirmed — Apple can't delve into iCloud backups and check the images that are stored there, either. That means the only time Apple will run CSAM checks on photos is when it's getting ready to upload them to iCloud Photos.

So yeah, there you go.

Looking for another source of backups that are a little less cloud-based? Check out this collection of the best external hard drives for things like Time Machine!

iCloud Photo Library is Apple's iCloud service for accessing all your photos and videos from any device currently logged into your Apple ID. If you've already got the best iPhone and one of the best Macs, it's the service that means all your media is on both devices without much effort on your part.

It works by using your iCloud storage space to upload new photos and videos within moments of you taking the perfect snap. That way, you can view them anywhere and at any time too. Take a photo on your iPhone 14 Pro and it'll show up on your iPad Pro or Mac in seconds. 

Besides being convenient, it also means iCloud Photo Library works well as a backup photo service, as well as syncing service and even storage optimizer. Simple to use for anyone keen to manage all their photos and videos, here's all you need to know about iCloud Photo Library.

What is iCloud Photo Library?

At its simplest, iCloud Photo Library is a great storage service for all your precious images and videos. There's more to it than that though as that also applies to any animated GIFs or images you save from the web. Basically, anything that ends up in your Camera Roll is saved to iCloud. From there, you can check the results out on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV, and even via your browser at iCloud.com.

If you're thinking about whether or not you should use iCloud Photo Library, the answer is clearly yes. While it's important to remember that it all counts towards your total iCloud storage so you might want to make sure to choose the right amount when picking your iCloud storage plan, it's worth the investment. 

Previously, My Photo Stream was an appealing alternative to iCloud Photo Library but it only gives access to your last 1,000 photos and videos, or the past 30 days of content, so it's fairly limited.

If you have any iCloud Photo Library and security concerns, don't be worried. It's all encrypted just like all your iPhone backups, iCloud Drive, and anything else on the service. 

How to set up iCloud Photo Library

Whether you're setting iCloud Photo Library up on your iPhone or iPad, or going the Mac route, the process is fortunately pretty simple to put into action. In many cases, it's automatically doing its thing without you realizing it's all good to go.

Even if you use a Windows PC alongside your iPhone or similar, you can still set up and use iCloud Photo Library on a Windows 10 with the process being very similar for Windows 11 users.  Using iCloud Photo Library really does mean you can access your media from anywhere.

How to use and manage iCloud Photo Library

Once you've got iCloud Photo Library set up and working, all your uploaded images or videos can be accessed on all your devices. If you're not sure where to start, it's simple to learn how to use your iCloud Photo Library on iPhone and iPad, as well as how to check them out on Mac, or even your Apple TV if you want a larger screen experience.

It's also possible to use your iCloud Photo Library on the web via iCloud.com too. That's a particularly handy method if you simply need to check in briefly to look at an image or video. There are also ways to view your iCloud Photo Library images offline for those increasingly rare times you haven't got an internet connection. 

One useful thing about iCloud Photo Library is it can actually save you space on your iPhone or Mac. It's a good idea to use the Optimize Storage feature on your iPhone, as well as your Mac, particularly if you're running low on space. It works by storing full-resolution images on iCloud rather than taking up all the space on your local device's storage. If you have an older device running out of room, it can really cut down on the effort involved in juggling all your storage demands.

How to set up and use iCloud Photo Sharing

Using iCloud gives you access to iCloud Photo Sharing. Part of iCloud Photo Library, it means you can easily share images and video from your albums with friends and family who also have an iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV, or PC. Setting up iCloud Photo Sharing is pretty easy to do too, saving you from having to share images in a more old-fashioned and potentially awkward way.

Once it's set up, you can view and create shared photo albums with ease. The people you share images with can even like, comment, and subscribe for updates on a shared photo album making it your own little cocoon of happy memories and connections. It's much easier to do than uploading everything to Facebook or Instagram, plus it's safer too. There's no need to make constant adjustments for sharing privileges. All images and video in the shared albums are only viewable by those you've shared with, and albums can be taken down at any time if needed.

If you and your family use Family Sharing, it's also possible to share photos just with your Family group which takes even less time to set up than other methods. The perfect solution for the latest batch of photos of the kids or a great vacation.

How to back up and troubleshoot iCloud Photo Library

It's tempting to make iCloud Photo Library your only photo backup, but you can never be too careful. It's always a good idea to back everything up several times, especially if it's important. 

It's easy to make a backup of your iCloud Photo Library so you're never too far away from fixing a potential catastrophe. Online backup services can also help here.

Generally, iCloud Photo Library simply just works, but if you run into any issues, try troubleshooting some common iCloud Photo Library problems first. Given the amount of cellular data that can be involved in using iCloud, it's worth keeping an eye on whether your cellular data plan is part of the problem with iCloud Photo Library too. Worst case -- don't forget to contact Apple support to resolve any ongoing issues.

Apple's cloud services have come a long way in recent years and very few aspects of iCloud are more impressive than iCloud Photo Library. Built into iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and tvOS, the service keeps your photo library perfectly in sync across all of your devices and it's pretty much rock-solid whether you're rocking the latest iPhone and iPad or not.

Take a picture on your iPhone and it will appear on your iPad in seconds. Edit a photo on your Mac and those changes are reflected on your other devices straight away, too. But iCloud Photo Library, even after the announcements last month at WWDC, is still missing a huge feature: proper family iCloud photo sharing support.

It's strange to see this feature still lacking since Apple has improved and encouraged use of its Family Sharing feature more and more over time. Initially, it was just a function for allowing shared purchases, shared calendaring, and parental controls, but it has been extended to include shared subscriptions, like Apple Music, iCloud storage, and even the Apple One bundle.

Apple knows this lack of a proper, unified family photo library is a problem as it has come up with various workarounds in order to try and fix it without just merging libraries. For example, when Family Sharing is set up, a Family album in iCloud is automatically created but this requires family members to manually add photos and videos to it, and it's limited to 5,000 items.

In the For You tab of the Photos app, you can also see Sharing Suggestions that prompt you to share a set of photos from a location or event with others that were also there in an effort to unify everyone's libraries. The recipient is even asked to use a feature called Share Back to throw some photos and videos the other way.

The problem is, this process still involves manually sending photos and videos to people, and choosing to save those down into your own library and duplicating them in the process. For many families, having multiple copies of the same photo is less than ideal and, at some point, you have to pick one person in the family who will hold the canonical photo library to avoid duplication.

I had hoped that Apple's latest updates to the Photos app at WWDC 2021 would address this problem once and for all. While Apple did take the wraps off a new Shared with You feature for different media types and an improved UI for photo sharing within Messages, the actual sharing of photos remains essentially unchanged.

What I'd love to see is an opt-in function that allows members of an iCloud family to automatically have their Photo Library kept in-sync together. I take a photo, it appears on my wife's iPad. She records a video, I can see it on my Mac. I turn a Live Photo into a looping gif, she sees that too. No AirDrop, no iMessage, just sync them together. All the time.

I understand this comes with privacy implications, and that's why I think this feature should be entirely opt-in, and perhaps even require an Apple ID password or Face ID/Touch ID authentication to set it up to avoid misuse, but I can't be alone in wanting this feature — it make sense for couples and allows families with children to get easy access to (and monitor) the photos they are taking.

It also comes with the potential problem of clutter in the Photos app, but the feature could be engineered to filter out things like screenshots and memes so these don't sync across everyone's devices. I'd also rather risk a little bit of clutter and save the time of manually importing everyone photos into one place and being solely responsible for the (lack of) upkeep of the family album.

What do you think? Do you wish there was better family sharing with photos? Let us know in the comments.

What you need to know

• It isn't just you, multiple Apple services are misbehaving today.
• Find My, multiple iCloud services, and Photos are all impacted.

No, it isn't just you. Multiple iCloud services including iCloud Mail, iCloud Drive, iCloud Calendar, and more are impacted by another outage. iCloud Photo Library is another important one that's experiencing "intermittent issues."

This isn't the first time in recent weeks that Apple's services have struggled under the load and it's unlikely to be the last, but the number of services that are having issues simultaneously will no doubt be a concern for those who are all-in on Apple's offerings. At the time of writing, Apple's system status page lists the following as experiencing intermittent issues.

• Find My.
• iCloud bookamerks & Tabs.
• iCloud Calendar.
• iCloud Contacts.
• iCloud Drive.
• iCloud Keychain.
• iCloud Mail.
• Photos — otherwise known as iCloud Photo Library.

The good news is that Apple is aware of the issue and continues to work on getting everything ironed out. The bad news is there's no telling how long any of that will take, nor why Apple continues to have these intermittent issues en masse.

Apple experienced a similar outage just a few days ago and as I said then, now might be a good time to remind everyone about the best external hard drives for backing up your Mac!

What you need to know

• Multiple Apple services are currently "slow or unavailable" for some users.
• Apple Photos, iCloud Backup, iCloud Mail, iCloud Drive, and iCloud Storage Upgrades are all affected.

Multiple Apple services are currently "slow or unavailable" for some users, Apple has confirmed. It also confirmed that it is working on getting all impacted services back up and running, too.

At the time of writing Apple is suffering from issues that are affecting Photos, iCloud Backup, iCloud Mail, iCloud Drive, and iCloud Storage Upgrades all at the same time. Apple isn't saying exactly what's wrong or when we can expect service to be restored, but it's possible this could be related to a wider internet issue caused by an Akamai CDN outage.

If this is indeed related to the Akamai outage it's likely there isn't a great deal Apple can do to get things back up and running, unfortunately.

Now might be a good time to remind everyone about the best external hard drives for backing up your Mac!

This story is live and will be updated when we know more ...

Yes, as the popular saying goes, "the best camera is the one with you." Most of us carry a smartphone that's more than capable of capturing fantastic photographs when we need them, but it lacks the fun and charm of an instant camera, such as the Fujifilm Instax Mini 9.

Back in the days before digital cameras, we had disposables and bulky, boxy Polaroids with instant photos. There's just something beautiful about snapping a photo and then watching the picture print out and develop right in front of your eyes. Then you're free to stick that cute little pic in a photo album, on the fridge, in a notebook, or send it to a loved one!

Yes! Fujifilm's Instax Mini film does go on sale quite frequently at places like Walmart and Amazon, but you do need to keep your eyes peeled. You can do this by checking the retailer's websites for sales, or by using something like Thrifter to track prices.When your timing is on and you find a sale, stock up! Film photography is a trendy hobby these days and prices swing up and down without notice.

Once you set up Siri on the best iPhone and iPad, you may forget that it's there. Every now and then, you may use it for something like setting a timer in the kitchen, but there are a lot of things that Siri can do. One of those things that you can ask Siri to do is help you find specific photos just by using your voice. There are a few different ways to search your photos with Siri, and we'll show you how!

Note: This feature worked in previous versions of iOS, but it has since been removed with the latest versions of iOS 15.

You can search for photos by typing in places or dates, or you can search by telling Siri where and when you want to look for them. Say "May, 2019," and you'll go right back. Ask for "Cupertino," and you'll be there. Combine the places and times, and Siri will take you anywhere — and any when — you want to go!

How to search photos with Siri based on time

Any photo you take on your iPhone or iPad is automatically timestamped with the date. So if you know when you took the photos you are looking for, Siri should help you find them.

1. Press and hold the Home or Side button to launch Siri, or say "Hey, Siri."
2. Say something like "Show me photos from September."

When using the time to find photos with Siri, you can even be more specific by saying a precise date, like "Show me pictures from Sept. 17th," or even less so by just saying a year.

How to search photos with Siri based on location

Unless you've turned off your location services, every photo taken on your iPhone or iPad is automatically tagged with geolocation, meaning that if you know where the photos were taken, Siri can find them for you.

1. Press and hold the Home or Side button to launch Siri, or say "Hey, Siri."
2. Say something like "Show me photos from Cupertino."

Once again, you can be as precise or as broad as you want.

You can do both!

It's worth mentioning that you can combine these methods to get better search results from Siri. If you went to Rome twice but are trying to show your friends pictures from the most recent trip, you can say something like, "Show me photos from Rome in May." You can also use Siri to search for photos in folders — asking for "Show me my selfies from November" will search the Selfies folder where your selfies are automatically filed.

1. Press and hold the Home or Side button to launch Siri, or say "Hey, Siri."
2. Say something like "Show me photos from Disneyland in 2019."

How to search photos with Siri based on objects

Apple added the ability to search for things like mountains, lakes, food, cats, and so on. If you search for something that isn't searchable in your Photos app, Siri will show you a web search result instead.

1. Press and hold the Home or Side button to launch Siri, or say "Hey, Siri."
2. Say something like "Show me photos of cats."

Did we miss anything?

Do you know of any other tricks about searching for photos with Siri? We want to know about them. Drop them in the comments below!

Updated April 2021: These are still the current steps for searching photos with Siri in iOS 14.

The Photos app on iPhone and iPad is one of the best tools to organize, edit and share your pictures. The app offers many editing features for your iPhone, and it can even compete with some of the best photo editing app on your Mac.

Whether you're a professional photographer or you're just starting to learn how to use the Camera app on your iPhone, learning how to manage and organize your picture through Photos is essential. Trying to learn everything in a day can be overwhelming, especially if you're just starting out. Luckily, you'll find everything you need to know about the Photos app on iPhone right here. You can always come back here when you need it. We'll keep updating this page with any new features Apple adds to Photos.

How to navigate Photos for iPhone and iPad

To help keep your pictures and videos organized, the Photos app automatically sorts them into smart groups based on time and location. You can see your pictures by day, month, or year. With them, you can quickly glance at when and where you were, scrub through everything and anything, see a map view of your photos spread out across the world, and even copy a photo to the clipboard so you can insert it into a message. There are still albums you can access as well. And all of it with just a few taps and swipes!

• How to move between Years, Months, and Days in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad
• How to view picture and video locations on a map
• How to quickly select a month to jump to from the Years view
• How to quickly copy pictures or videos to the clipboard from Moments
• How to hide images in the Photos app
• Live Photos: The Ultimate Guide

How to organize photos and videos into albums on your iPhone or iPad

The Photos app on iPhone and iPad gives you quick and easy access to all your pictures and videos. Camera Roll/All Photos, My Photos Stream, Panoramas, Videos, even Selfies all have their own dedicated albums. While you can't change or delete any of those, you can add and manage albums of your own. That way, exactly the photos you want are exactly where you want them.

• How to create new albums with the Photos app for iPhone and iPad
• How to add photos and videos to existing albums with the Photos app for iPhone and iPad
• How to transfer photos from your Mac or PC to your iPhone or iPad

How to use Memories in Photos for iPhone and iPad

Great digital cameras like on the iPhone and iPad mean we can take as many photos as we want, whenever we want. That's amazing because we can record any moment, at any time. It's also terrible because we end up with so many photos we forget about the ones we took even a short time ago. By using Memories on your iPhone or iPad, you can forget about forgetting your pictures with a few taps.

• How to use Memories in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad
• How to search Memories
• How to start a slideshow in Memories
• How to change your slideshow theme in Memories
• How to edit your title, music, duration, and photos in a Memories slideshow
• How to save a Memories slideshow
• How to delete certain photos from a Memories slideshow
• How to delete a Memory slideshow
• How to see who was in your Memories slideshow
• How to see where your Memories took place on a map

How to add, remove, change, or hide People in Photos

Apple uses machine learning to recognize people inside your images and identify the same person in multiple photos. Like Facebook's algorithm, it's not perfect, but it's easy enough to correct. Here's how you can view common faces, put names to them, remove faces that have been misidentified, and hide faces you don't particularly want to see.

• Why do I want to use the People album?
• How to name or rename People in the Photos app
• How to remove People or Faces that have been wrongly identified in the Photos app
• How to add new People or Faces to the Photos app
• How to add Favorite People or Faces in the Photos app
• How to merge multiple People and Faces collections into a single person in the Photos app
• How to delete pictures that have been wrongly identified in the Photos app

How to rotate, crop, and straighten in Photos for iPhone and iPad

Most of us don't frame every photo perfectly when we shoot it. That's why Apple provides editing tools right inside the Photos app that let you straighten, rotate, crop, and even change your pictures' aspect ratio easily. That way, you get your photos, and you get them framed just the way you want them.

• How to rotate in Photos
• How to straighten in Photos
• How to crop in Photos
• How to crop and resize photos
• How to change the aspect ratio in Photos
• How to edit videos on iPhone and iPad

How to use adjust light, color, and B&W in Photos for iPhone and iPad

Smart adjustments in Photos let you enhance your images, either automatically, intuitively, or precisely. The Magic wand is still there, of course, but you can also change light, color, and black and white with a swipe, or dive down into brightness, warmth, and other details. Crank it up, crush it down, or go gray. It's all up to you!

• How to take photos, selfies, bursts, and more with your iPhone or iPad
• How to get great Night mode photos on your iPhone 11
• How to enhance images in Photos
• How to change the lighting in your photos on iPhone and iPad
• How to change color within Photos
• How to convert to black and white in Photos
• How to revert back to the original in Photos

How to apply filters in Photos for iPhone and iPad

Filters were once used to try and salvage the often-poor images captured by iPhone cameras. Now that iPhones have good cameras, filters are simply a way to have some fun. Flashes are another story. You can now apply live filters right from the Camera app.

• How to use filters in Photos for iPhone and iPad
• How to apply live filters with the Camera app on iPhone and iPad

How to markup images in Photos for iPhone and iPad

Did you know that the Photos app has a markup editor natively built-in? With the Markup editor, you're able to draw and doodle on your photos, add callouts to highlight specific areas of an image, and add text for funny captions. You can definitely get creative with your photos with markup, so feel free to let loose!

• How to use the Markup editor in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

How to use extensions in Photos for iPhone and iPad

The Photos app works as a central hub for filters and effects pulled from all the extensibility-compatible editing apps you've downloaded from the App Store. Find the apps, install them, enable them, and then you can apply them all right from the Photos app. Best of all, they're non-destructive. That means you can change, remove, and revert them at any time.

• How to turn on photo and video extensions in Photos
• How to access and use photo and video extensions in Photos

How to make slideshows, contacts, and wallpapers from Photos for iPhone and iPad

Want to show off your pictures and videos to friends and family? You can create custom wallpapers and contact pictures, and even custom slideshows with automagic animations, transitions, and music that you can share on your iPhone or iPad or send to your Apple TV over AirPlay.

• How to assign pictures to contacts using the Photos app for iPhone and iPad
• How to set your iPhone or iPad wallpaper using the Photos apps
• How to start a slideshow with the Photos app for iPhone and iPad
• How to AirPlay your photos to your TV

How to print and share from Photos for iPhone and iPad

Keeping all your pictures and videos in the Photos app is incredibly convenient, but sometimes you just want to share them with others. That's where the Share Sheet comes in. With it, you can send pictures and videos through AirDrop, iMessage, Mail, iCloud, Twitter, Facebook, and more. You can even use AirPrint to make hard copies of your favorite images.

You can search for photos by typing in places or dates, or you can search by telling Siri where and when you want to look for. Say "May 2019," and you'll go right back. Ask for "Cupertino," and you'll be there. Combine the places and times, and Siri will take you anywhere — and anywhen — you want to go.

• How to share individual photos
• How to share multiple photos
• How to print photos
• How to find photos with Siri based on time
• How to find photo with Siri based on location
• How to find photos with Siri... using both!
• How to search for people, places, animals, and things in the Photos app for iPhone and iPad

Any Photos questions?

If you have any questions about the Photos app on iPhone or iPad, drop them in the comments below!

Updated November 2020: Updated for iOS 14 nad iPadOS 14.

No one can refute that iPhones and iPads can take some stunning shots with their rear cameras. There are loads of features on board to make sure that you can make every picture as incredible as it can be – even those ones that don't look quite so good in the camera roll. Those pictures can be easily edited within the photos app on your iPhone or iPad – no need for a third-party app to rotate, crop, or straighten your photos. We love iPhone photography here at iMore, so we've put all our tips together here in step-by-step instructions.

How to rotate in Photos on iPhone or iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find the photo you want to rotate and tap it to open it.

3. Tap Edit in the top right corner.
4. Tap on the Crop button in the bottom menu.

5. Tap the Rotate button in the top menu.
   • It is the second button from the left with a curved arrow.
   • Tap it until you get your desired rotation.
6. Tap Done to save your changes.

How to straighten in Photos on iPhone or iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find a photo you want to straighten and tap on it to open.

3. Tap Edit in the upper right corner.
4. Tap on the Crop button in the bottom menu.

5. By default, it goes to Straighten. Drag your finger along the bottom dial to straighten your image.
6. If you need to straighten the image vertically or horizontally, tap on either Vertical or Horizontal (located next to the default Straighten option).

7. Adjust the slider until you are satisfied with the results.
8. Tap Done to save your changes.

Sometimes you'll need to vertically or horizontally straighten your image to get a better perspective. This is especially true if you are taking photos of architecture and buildings, and want a straight edge on the walls rather than a skewed perspective due to the lens.

How to crop in Photos on iPhone or iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find the photo you want to crop, and then tap on it to open.

3. Tap Edit in the upper right corner.
4. Tap the Crop button in the bottom menu.

5. Tap and drag on the corner handles of the crop until you're satisfied with the results.
6. Tap Done to save your changes.

How to change the aspect ratio for crops on iPhone and iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find a photo you want to crop, then tap on it to open.

3. Tap Edit in the top right corner.
4. Tap on the Crop button in the bottom menu.

5. Tap the Aspect Ratio button at the top (it's the one with multiple rectangles in one located next to the options button or the "..." button).
6. Scroll through the aspect ratio options by swiping horizontally.
7. Tap the ratio you want to use (the default is Freeform).
8. Tap Done to save your changes.

Start editing

Whether you're using one of the best iPhones or best iPads, now you can edit your shots on the go, and make them look as good as they deserve. We're always writing more how-tos as well, so if you want to learn more about your iPhone, iPad, or Mac, there are loads of tips and tricks to find.

We all have images cluttering our iPhone. Maybe they're memes, cooking recipes, or a motivational picture that you got in the Mail. It's the type of images that you wouldn't hang in your digital photo frame, but you don't want to get rid of them, in case you need them. Fortunately, iOS 14 and iPadOS 14 have a solution for these types of pictures: A hidden folder. Here's how you can hide images in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad.

What does hiding a photo do, exactly?

When you hide an image from your Photos library, it effectively disappears from your main photos view (which includes Moments, Collections, and Years). The image will still be available in Albums and searches, however.

Where can I find my Hidden album?

The Hidden album is located in the Photos app, in the Albums tab, right at the bottom. However, it's possible that you can't see it there. Fear not, what happens is that Apple gives you the option to hide your Hidden album too. If you don't see it, here's what you need to do.

1. Open the Settings app.
2. Scroll down and tap on Photos.
3. Scroll down again until you find Hidden Album.
4. Toggle Hidden album on or off if you want to show or hide it.

1. Open the Photos app.
2. Tap on the Albums tab.
3. Scroll down and tap on Hidden under the utilities section.

How to hide images in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. In either the Days, All Photos, or standard Albums view, tap on the Select button.

3. Tap on the photos that you want to hide.
   • Optionally, you can also just view individual photos and hide one-by-one instead of a batch.
4. Tap the Share button.

5. Scroll down in the Share Sheet.
6. Tap on Hide.
7. Confirm that you want to hide the photos, or tap Cancel if you change your mind.

How to unhide images in the Photos app

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums.

3. Scroll down to the bottom and tap on Hidden.
4. Tap Select.

5. Choose the photos or videos that you want to unhide.
6. Tap the Share button.
7. Scroll down and tap Unhide.

Questions?

Let us know in the comments down below!

Updated October 2020: Updated for iOS 14.

The Photos app lets you customize and make adjustments to your pictures with a simple swipe or tap. Thanks to the Auto Enhance feature, that is the magic wand, you can change the saturation of your photos, turn them into black and white, or revert them back to the original.  All that right on your iPhone or iPad. Here's how you can adjust light and colors in the Photos app!

How to enhance images in Photos on iPhone and iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find a photo you want to enhance and tap to open it.

3. Tap Edit in the upper right corner.
4. Make sure you're in the Lighting section (dial with dots around it) and then tap the Auto-Enhance button (it looks like a magic wand).

5. You can slide the dial at the bottom to adjust the intensity of the Auto-Enhance feature. This adjusts other aspects automatically.
6. Tap Done in the bottom right corner once you are satisfied with your changes.

How to change the lighting in your photos on iPhone and iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find a photo and tap it to open it.

3. Tap Edit in the upper right corner.
4. Tap the Lighting button in the bottom menu bar (it looks like a dial with dots around it).

5. Swipe horizontally through the different lighting aspect categories and tap the one you want to adjust.

6. For each adjustment you want to make, slide the dial at the bottom left to right for a weaker or stronger effect.
7. Tap Done in the bottom right corner to save your changes.

How to change color in your photos on iPhone and iPad

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find a photo and tap it to open it.

3. Tap the Edit button.
4. Tap the Color button in the middle of the bottom menu bar.
5. Swipe left and right to find a color filter that you like — it is applied on your image in real-time.

6. If you want to make more adjustments to color, tap on the Lighting button (dial with dots around it) at the bottom menu bar.
7. Swipe until you find Saturation, Vibrance, Warmth, and Tint.

8. Adjust the dial on these until you're satisfied.
9. Tap Done in the bottom right corner to save all changes.

How to convert photos to black and white in the Photos app

Previously in iOS, there was an option to smartly convert your photo to black and white. Like the lighting and color smart adjustments, the black and white option is no longer available. However, you can change it to B&W through filters on iOS 14.

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find a photo and tap it to open it.

3. Tap the Edit button.
4. Tap the Color button in the bottom menu bar.
5. Swipe through the filters until you get to the three black and white ones: Mono, Silvertone, and Noir. They're automatically applied to your photo as you browse.

6. If you need to make adjustments, tap the Lighting button to make changes to individual lighting aspects.
7. Tap Done to save your changes.

How to revert back to the original photo

You can edit your pictures and adjust light and color in the Photos app all you want. But if you're not satisfied with the end result, you can always revert all the changes you made in an instant and get the original photo back. Here's how!

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Find a photo that you edited through the Photos app.

3. Tap Edit in the upper right corner.
4. Tap Revert in the bottom right corner (where Done usually is).
5. Confirm that you want to revert the edited image back to its original form.

Making good photos spectacular

With the release of the iPhone 14 Pro, the photos you can take with iPhone are ever-more impressive. You can use these built-in editing features to take them from good to spectacular! 

In fact, with the latest version of iOS, you can go even further and lift photo subjects out of the background to be used in stickers and emojis. It seems there's no end to the ways you can edit and enhance photos on iPhone and iPad. All these tools can help you turn your normal pictures into amazing photos that are worthy of putting on your digital frame.

September 2022: Updated for latest version of iOS.

The Photos app stores all your pictures and videos in one place. While this is convenient, it also makes it a bit a mess, especially if you have a ton of photos and videos to sort through on your iPhone or iPad. Fortunately, there's a way to organize your captured content into albums on iPhone and iPad. You can quickly move your pictures into specific folders to separate your family shots, funny memes, or professional photos. Here's how!

How to create new albums in the Photos app

1. Open Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Albums tab.
3. Tap the + button in the upper left corner.

4. Tap New Album.
5. Title the album and tap on Save.
6. Tap photos that you want to add to the album.
7. Tap Done.

How to create new shared albums in the Photos app

With the Photos app, you can also create an album that you can share with other people. This is really helpful if you want to have an album with your family or friends, where you or other members can look at your pictures and even add some of their own from their best iPhone or best iPad. Here's how you can create one.

1. Open Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap Albums.
3. Tap the + button in the upper-left corner.

4. Open photos on your iPhone or iPad.
5. Tab albums.
6. Tap the + sign in the upper left corner. 
7. Tap New Shared Album.
8. Enter a name for your album.
9. Tap next.

7. Enter the names of the people with whom you'd like to share your album.
8. Tap create.
9. Tap the shared album.

10. Tap the + button.
11. Tap any photos that you want to add to the album.
12. Tap done.
13. If you want, you can type something to caption the pictures you added.
14. Tap post.

How to add photos and videos to existing albums with the Photos app

If you really want to learn how to organize your photos into albums on iPhone or your iPad, you need to know how to add photos to an existing album. Luckily, this is pretty easy. Just follow these steps:

1. Open Photos on your iPhone and iPad.
2. Tap the Library tab.
3. Tap Years, Months, Days or All Photos.

4. Tap Select.
5. Tap on photos that you want to add to an album.
6. Tap the Share button on the bottom left corner..

7. Tap Add to Album or Add to Shared Album.
8. Tap on the album to which you'd like to add your photos.

Your photos will be added to your chosen album.

How to delete existing albums in the Photos app

One thing is to create and organize your folders, another is to delete the unnecesary folders you've made. Doing so is really easy and it'll only take a few taps.

1. Open the Photos app.
2. Tap on the Albums tab.
3. Tap on See all next to My Albums.

4. Tap on Edit.
5. Select the Album you want to delete and tap on the - icon on the left of the album.
6. Tap Delete Album.

7. Tap done.

How do you keep your photos organized?

Now you know how to keep your photos and videos organized in albums on your iPhone or iPad running iOS 16 so you can easily locate and access your captured content. 

Looking to upgrade your iPhone? Make sure you're getting the best price by checking in with our guides. We've got you covered for iPhone 14 deals and the larger model's iPhone 14 Plus deals. If you're looking for a fancy upgrade, complete with the Dynamic Island feature, then the iPhone 14 Pro deals, and iPhone 14 Pro Max deals can help cut down those monthly fees and help maximize your trade-in options.

If you're looking to upgrade your iPad, check out these sweet iPad deals. 

No you can enjoy scrolling through shared and created albums of all your special moments on your iPhone 14, iPad (2021), or iPhone 14 Pro! 

Updated September 2022: Updated for iOS 16.

The Photos app on iPhone and iPad has a bunch of features that help you keep your pictures and videos organized and all in one place. You can quickly see your pictures by day, month, or year, and even check where you were when you took the picture. Now, it's easier than ever to search for a picture of that trip you took to place it on your digital photo frame.

Plus, thanks to iOS 14 and iPadOS 14, the Photos app has had a few changes to make it easier to use. Here's how you can navigate the Photos app on iPhone and iPad.

How to move between Years, Months, and Days in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

1. Launch Photos from your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap on the Library tab at the bottom left corner if you're not already there.

3. Tap on the timeline view that you want to see: Years, Months, Days, or All Photos.
   • If you start at Years and then tap on a year, it will drill down into Months.
   • If you're in Months and tap on a month, it goes into Days view.
   • Tapping on an image will show you all the photos from that day.
4. You can back out of your view by tapping on Years, Months, or Days in the menu bar above the tabs for Photos.

You can swipe from the left bezel of your device to go back to the previous level. However, if you are viewing individual photos, this gesture won't work. You will need to tap on the back button in the top left, as swiping only goes to the previous or next photo.

How to view picture and video locations on a map in Photos

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Make sure you are on the Library tab, where you can switch between Years, Months, Days, and All Photos as described above.

3. In either Months or Days view, tap on the "..." button that is shown on the collection thumbnail.
4. Tap Show Map.

A map will pull up and show you where the photos for that day or month were taken on a map. Again, you need to have Location Services turned on for your Camera app in order to record the geolocation data when taking photos. This cannot be applied retroactively.

You can also still view location data on an individual photo or video by viewing it and then scrolling down.

How to quickly select a month to jump to from the Years view

In iOS 14, you can't exactly view a year's worth of photos at a glance as you could in previous iterations of iOS. Instead, each year is represented by a tile that rotates through an image from each month of the year. Tapping on the year tile will jump into the month for the image that was being shown in the tile as you tapped it. You can adjust quickly jump to a month by using the scrubbing gesture.

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Make sure you're in the Library tab that organizes by Years, Months, and Days.
3. Tap on the Years view in Photos.

4. Find the year you want to view.
5. Drag your finger horizontally across the tile.
   • You should see the month appear underneath the year, and the tile's thumbnail changes as you go through the months.
6. Tap on collection title to automatically jump into the month that you left it on while scrubbing.

How to quickly copy pictures or videos to the clipboard from Moments

1. Launch Photos on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Go into the Library tab if you're not already in there.
3. Find the photos or videos that you want to share from the All Photos view.
4. Tap on Select in the top right.

5. Tap on the photos or videos that you want to share, or drag your finger across rows and columns to quickly select a batch.
6. Tap on the Share button. That's the little square icon with an arrow pointing up on the bottom left corner of your screen.
7. Scroll down and select Copy Photos.

Now your photos or videos will be on your device's clipboard, so you can paste them into a message or document where media is supported. If you just want to copy one picture or video, you can long-press it until you see the action menu. Then tap on Copy.

Have any questions?

Now that you know how to navigate your Photos app on iPhone and iPad, you can quickly access all your fond memories. Still, if you have any questions, drop them in the comments below.

Updated October 2020: Updated for iOS 14 and iPadOS 14.

If you want your Mac's photos to wirelessly sync to all your other iOS devices and computers, you want to set up iCloud Photo Library: Apple's photo sync service lets you back up your images on all your devices, as well as access them — online or offline — on said devices. If you're willing to pay for the extra iCloud storage space, you can store an incredible amount of photos and videos, all accessible at the touch of a button or multi-touch screen. Here's how to set up iCloud photo library on Mac!

Using a PC instead? Here's how to set up iCloud Photo Library on Windows

Here's how to set it up on your Mac and get everything configured to your liking!

How to set up iCloud Photo Library on your Mac

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Select the Photos menu in the upper left corner of your screen.
3. Go to Preferences.
4. Click on the iCloud tab.

5. Check "iCloud Photos." This will begin uploading any and all images you have stored in the Photos app to iCloud.

How to optimize your photo and video storage

If you routinely shoot 4K video or high-quality images on your iPhone, iPad, or DSLR, you may run out of storage space fast. (I have a 1TB iMac, but also have almost a terabyte of 4K video stored in iCloud — it gets unwieldy, fast!) This is especially true if you have a Mac laptop with limited hard drive space: It's nice to look at your iPhone's gorgeous Portrait mode photos, but not necessarily always practical to store all of them locally.

Thankfully, Apple offers an Optimize Storage option, which lets you store full-resolution photos and videos of only your most recently shot and accessed imagery; all older photos and videos are available to download via iCloud and are stored as low-resolution previews on your device to save space. You can switch between optimizing your Mac's photos storage or storing your full library locally: Here's how!

Note: If you plan on using Optimize Storage, we suggest having at least one device that stores your entire library locally (usually a Mac with a large local or external hard drive), so you have multiple backups of your photographs and video.

1. Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
2. Click Photos in the App menu in the upper left corner of your screen.
3. Select Preferences from the drop-down menu.

4. Click the iCloud tab.
5. Click Optimize Mac Storage.

Full-resolution versions of your photos and videos will be uploaded to iCloud.

How to share photos with iCloud Photo Library

Apple's photo service doesn't just provide online backups and sync for your images and video: The company also offers a free sharing service that allows you to send shared albums to friends and family (or create a publicly-shared website). Here's how to turn it on for your Mac.

How to set up and use iCloud Photo Sharing

Questions?

Do you have any questions on how to set up iCloud photo library on Mac? Let us know in the comments below.

Updated September 2020: Refreshed.

While iCloud Photos is a great feature for viewing your entire library at a glance from any device, it comes at a cost: You need to have an internet connection to truly take advantage of the service's cloud storage.

If you're syncing and uploading your images over Wi-Fi, this isn't a huge deal, but if you tend to look at a lot of images and video over cellular, you may want to take a look at your cellular usage and how to better control it. Here's how to go about it.

How to pause iCloud Photos sync for the day on your iPhone or iPad

1. Open the Photos app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Go to the Photos tab and make sure you're in All Photos view.
3. At the bottom of the screen, press Pause next to the Uploading queue.
4. Confirm by pressing Pause again.

To restart sync, you can press Resume; otherwise, your iPhone and iPad will resume syncing at the end of the evening.

How to adjust cellular settings for iCloud Photos on your iPhone or iPad

1. Open the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Scroll to the Photos option and tap on it.

3. Scroll to the Cellular Data option and select it.

There are two options for adjusting your cellular data settings regarding the Photos app and iCloud Photos:

• Cellular Data: This toggle allows you to sync your most recent snaps and video to iCloud Photos via cellular data plan, and download images and video. That said, your iPhone will prefer to upload via Wi-Fi, and will only use cellular if your library hasn't been synced recently over Wi-Fi.
• Unlimited Updates: This toggle removes the caveat I mentioned above — with this toggle activated, your iPhone will sync over cellular data the same way it would over Wi-Fi.

In general, you shouldn't need to enable anything but Cellular Data to download your older iCloud Photos images over LTE, or to occasionally sync new photos and video. That said, if you're getting an error while trying to download an older image or video, you may want to temporarily turn on Unlimited Updates to properly download it. (Just remember to disable it again after the fact, lest you get a pricey data bill at the end of the month.)

How to quickly kill cellular data for the Photos app on iPhone or iPad

If you don't want to fiddle with the more-granular settings available for iCloud Photos and just want to disable all cellular access for the Photos app, here's how to do it.

1. Open the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Go to the Cellular option.
3. Scroll down to the Photos toggle and disable it.

Let us know below.

More iCloud Photos guides

○ Should you use it? ○ iCloud Photo Library and Photo Stream: What's the difference? ○ Which storage plan should you choose? ○ How to use it on iPhone and iPad ○ How to use it on your Mac or PC ○ How to access it on the web ○ How to view images while offline ○ How to use Family Sharing with iCloud ○ How to free up storage space on your iPhone ○ How to transfer photos from your Mac or PC ○ How to recover deleted images and video ○ How to back up iCloud Photo Library ○ Troubleshooting iCloud Photo Library ○

A few iOS releases back, Apple introduced a Markup editor in the Photos app. The Markup editor can be access in the Photos app on both iPhone and iPad, and it allows you to draw on photos, highlight specific areas with callouts, add text for fun captions, and more. Here's how to get the most out of the Markup editor in the Photos app, without ever having to download a third-party app!

How to access the Markup editor in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

Though you can draw on photos and video inside Messages for spur-of-the-moment fun, you can also access a more thorough Markup editor from the Photos app itself. (Just for images, unfortunately — there are no tools available for video at this time.)

1. Launch Photos from your home screen.
2. Tap the Photos tab in the lower-left corner of the screen.
3. Select the photo you want to edit.
4. Tap Edit.

5. Tap the More (…) button.
6. Tap Markup.

You can now add doodles, callouts, and text to your photos.

How to draw on your photos with the Markup editor in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

Once you're in the Markup editor, the fun begins.

1. Tap your preferred drawing tool along the bottom. Your options include a pen, a highlighter, and a pencil. There is also an eraser.
2. Tap the color picker circle to the right to choose a color for your drawing tool (except eraser).
3. Begin doodling on your photo.

Want a thinner or thicker line? Here's how to go about doing it.

1. Tap your preferred drawing tool along the bottom if not already chosen.
2. Tap your drawing tool again to bring up the sizes for that tool.
3. Select the thickness of your paintbrush, as well as color opacity.

How to make a callout in the Markup editor in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

If you want to highlight a specific aspect of your photo, you can add a callout. Here's how!

1. While in Markup mode, tap the plus + button, located in the bottom right corner.
2. Select Magnifier.
3. Touch and drag the callout to highlight any aspect of your image.
4. To adjust the size, touch and slide the blue dot alongside the callout circle.
5. To adjust the magnification of the callout, touch and slide the green dot alongside the callout circle.

6. To change the color of your callout, just tap on the color you want to use from the color menu at the bottom. There is also a color picker if you want to use a non-standard color.

How to add text to a photo in the Markup editor in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

Need to add a funny caption to your photo? You're in luck: Markup offers text addition, too.

1. While in Markup mode, tap the plus + button, located in the bottom right corner.
2. Tap Text.
3. Drag the blue handles at the ends of the box to make it larger, and touch and drag the entire box to move it around.

4. Double-tap the text to go into editing mode, and type in the text you want.
5. Tap a color at the bottom if you want to change it — there is also a color picker if the color you want isn't in the standard options.
6. Tap anywhere outside the text box to finish.

1. Tap the Font button in the lower-left corner (it has two As on it).
2. Tap Helvetica, Georgia, or Noteworthy to select a font face.

1. Tap the Font button in the lower-left corner (it has two As on it).
2. Move the slider to adjust your font size.

1. Tap the Font button in the lower-left corner (it has two As on it).
2. Tap the text alignment you would like (left, center, right, or justified) in the resulting menu.

How to undo or redo a move in the Markup editor in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad

Made a mistake in your markup? You can quickly undo it with the tap of a button. Just tap the curved arrow to the left if you want to undo, and you can do this as many times as necessary. To redo, just tap the curved arrow to the right.

Questions?

Want to know something else about the Markup editor in the Photos app on iPhone and iPad? Let us know in the comments!

Updated August 2020: Updated for the latest versions of iOS.

Perhaps the simplest way to edit a photo on iOS and iPadOS is to use a filter. The Photos app for iPhone and iPad offers nine filters — including vivid, dramatic, mono, silvertone, and more. You can apply them to your photos in just a few taps, and these can definitely help perk up any picture, so give it a try!

How to use filters in the Photos app for iPhone and iPad

Filters in the Photos app are handy when you want to salvage an image or a photo that didn't turn out the way you'd hoped, or you want to change the mood and go for a unique effect.

1. Launch the Photos app from your Home screen.
2. Tap on the photo you want to filter.
3. Tap the Edit button at the top right of the screen.

4. Tap the Filters button in the bottom menu in the middle.
5. Scroll, then tap on the filter you want to apply.
6. Tap Done.

When you're ready to push your iPhone photo-editing to fun, new level, you should consider a third-party app, which will offer more choices than the native Photos app. Among the more interesting ones available in the App Store are Prisma, Popsicolor, and Olli by Tinrocket. Or you could stick with a more traditional photo editing app too, as these always have their own set filters and effects to enhance photos. Experimentation is key!

How to apply live filters with the Camera app on iPhone and iPad

Did you know that in addition to applying the filters in the editing process, you can also take photos with the filter already applied? These are called "live" photo filters, and you can easily access them from the Camera app. Using live photo filters lets you see how the image will turn out with the filter before you even take the photo! It's great and convenient if you just want to take the pictures as-is, without having to edit them later.

How to use live photo filters with the Camera on iPhone

Questions?

Let us know in the comments below!

Updated August 2020: Updated for the latest versions of iOS.

What you need to know

• Mimeo Photos is launching new wall decor products.
• The wall decor comes in canvas, metal, and acrylic options.
• All wall decor options can be in portrait or landscape orientation.
• Wall decor comes in four sizes: 8x10", 11x14", 16x20", and 20x30".
• Wall Decor products start at $34.99.
• You can order your own through the Mimeo Photos Mac app or from the website.

Mimeo Photos, the No. 1 photo product extension in the Mac App Store for premium photo books, prints, calendars, cards, and more, has launched a new line of wall decor products. Users of Mimeo Photos can now turn their photos into unique acrylic, metal, or canvas wall decorations, which range in size from standard 8-by-10-inches up to 20-by-30-inches.

If you've never heard of Mimeo Photos, the company has been handcrafting photo books, cards, and calendars for Apple for over a decade. In 2017, Apple ended its in-house photo printing services with Mimeo, resulting in Mimeo Photos launching as a macOS app extension.

With these new wall decor products, customers will have three options to choose from:

The classic gallery wrapped canvas wall decoration comes with hinged hardware so you can hang it up anywhere to warm up the surrounding space. The 8-by-10-inch size even comes with an easel back so you can display it easily on a tabletop. The gallery-grade canvas is carefully stretched over a perfectly-cornered frame and has a special coating that keeps your images looking as stunning as ever.

The premium metal wall decor arrives ready to go with an easy-to-display mounting block. Images are infused onto a lightweight metal panel with a glossy finish, and this decoration adds a modern touch to any room in the house.

The acrylic option arrives ready to display, with a mounting block for the 8-by-10-inch size, and a french cleat for all other sizes. This decoration adds a delightful, upscale element to any home. With the acrylic, you get an optically clear digital grade acrylic pane that measures .220-inches thick with polished edges. The clear layer's depth creates a distinctive 3D effect that is unlike any of the other decor options.

No matter which option you choose, all of the wall decor can come in portrait or landscape orientation, and you have four sizes to choose from: 8x10", 11x14", 16x20", and 20x30". They can also have varying themes, including single, double, and even four image displays. All wall decor can also be enhanced with text, borders, background colors, and patterns if you wish.

Mimeo Photos Wall Decor will start at $34.99 and go up from there, depending on which option you choose and the size. To begin creating your own wall decor, make sure to download the app on the Mac App Store or head on over to www.mimeophotos.com.

Pictures and videos take up a ton of storage space, and for good reason — all that data is what makes your photographs and snaps look phenomenal. But if you're hitting that pesky "out of storage" error while trying to take pictures on a 64GB iPhone, outstanding photos become less of a delight — you'd settle for being able to take any photo, at that point.

Luckily, you don't have to compromise: Apple's iCloud Photos lets you store all your images and video online, freeing valuable storage space on your device. And if you're still having trouble, we've got a few other tips to help get you back to image snapping glory.

• How to enable iCloud Photos and free up storage space
• How to free up more space on your iPhone to take photos

How to enable iCloud Photos and free up storage space

By default, when you take a photo with your iPhone or iPad, it gets stored on that device. Snap a selfie? Shoot a video? All of it gets locally saved. But photos and videos take up valuable storage space — and it can be a pain to continually remember to move old photos to your computer (or delete old images) so that you can take new ones.

Instead, Apple offers iCloud Photos: If you've ever used Dropbox before, it's like that — When you turn on iCloud Photos and are on Wi-Fi, Apple will automatically and securely upload all images and video from your iPhone or iPad to your iCloud account, where it can then be redownloaded and synced to your Mac, iPad, iPhone, or the web via iCloud.com; any piece of tech that has iCloud Photos enabled will receive any photo or video present on your other synced devices.

This is a nice sync and backup system to ensure that all your images are on all your devices, but it doesn't solve the problem of having too many images on your iPhone or iPad. When you delete an image locally, it will try and delete it everywhere if iCloud Photos is enabled. Not exactly what the average user wants.

Instead, Apple offers an option called Optimize iPhone Storage: When checked, your iPhone or iPad will locally store only the latest images and video you've shot or viewed; the others live up in iCloud, ready to be downloaded when you need them — and not taking up storage space when you don't.

You can view any of the images you have stored on iCloud at any time. If you'd like to download them onto your device for any reason, simply click the Share button in the lower-left corner, then scroll down to click Save Image. Once you download a certain number of images and videos, your device will intelligently sync the oldest ones you've viewed back up to iCloud and then delete them from local storage, thus preventing you from having to do manual image and video pruning.

If you think this sounds like a good deal for your iPhone, you're right: It keeps your local storage happy and saves you from having to delete adorable baby pictures of your cousin.

Here's how you go about setting up iCloud Photos and Optimize iPhone Storage.

1. Make sure you're on Wi-Fi.
2. Enable iCloud Photos.
3. Launch the Settings app.
4. Tap Photos.

1. Select Optimize iPhone Storage.

Once you do so, iCloud will automatically remove older images from your device, storing only the most recent images locally.

The rest of those images and videos will continue to be stored safely in iCloud at full resolution and in their native format — JPG, PNG, MOV, or RAW — and continue to be downloaded to all other devices where you've selected the "Download and Keep Originals" option. (I highly encourage enabling this full storage option on a device like a desktop Mac, so you always have a full offline backup of your photos.)

It may take a while for these changes to take place, especially if you're on a slower Wi-Fi network, so don't despair if your storage space doesn't initially free up.

How to free up more space on your iPhone to take photos

If you have a 64GB iPhone, turning on iCloud Photos might not be enough — you may need to do some more sprucing on your iPhone to make your Camera happy. Here are a few tips I've found that work well to quickly clear up space.

Not sure what's clogging up room on your iPhone? You can check your available space at any time by going to Settings > General > iPhone Storage.

From the storage management section, you can see exactly what apps are hogging your iPhone or iPad's available space — and, if you want to, delete them right then and there by tapping on the app and pressing Delete App. Be warned, however, that if you delete certain apps, you may delete any saved or stored data, as well.

By default, the Messages app saves all the gifs, stickers, videos, and other multimedia you share with your friends directly to your device. To get rid of it, you have to manually delete threads from the Messages app.

But you can prevent clogging from happening in the future: In Settings > Messages, you can reduce the largesse of your messages files by changing how long you Keep Messages (30 days, a year, or forever) and by turning on Low Quality Image Mode, which automatically reduces the file size of potentially gigantic gifs and other photos.

If you don't use Apple Music (or even if you do but have songs saved offline), your local music library can quickly overwhelm your iPhone. To keep your Adele songs from choking your selfie game, go to Settings > General > iPhone Storage > Music, then swipe left on any artist entry you wish to delete.

And if you have an Apple Music or iTunes Match subscription, you can further reduce your storage costs by turning on Optimize Storage in Settings > Music.

Are these tricks not working for you? We've collected a few other suggestions for items you can trim from your iPhone or iPad below.

• Out of storage error on your iPhone? Here's the fix!
• How to find and remove 'Other' files from iPhone and iPad
• How to delete files from iCloud on your iPhone or iPad

Questions?

Any other tips, tricks, or questions about freeing up your local storage or iCloud space so that you can snap photographs? Let us know in the comments.

Updated May 2020: Updated instructions for use with iOS 13.

iCloud Photo Library is part of iCloud, Apple's storage and sync service. When combined with one of iCloud's paid storage tiers, you can use it to store thousands of photos and videos and share it with your other devices — including your Apple TV.

Unlike Apple's other devices, however, your Apple TV can't download images from your Photos library. Instead, it relies solely on iCloud streaming. Before you can display your photos and video on your TV, you'll first need to set up the iCloud Photo Library.

• How can I view photos on Apple TV?
• How to enable iCloud Photo Library
• How to enable iCloud Photo Sharing

How can I view photos on Apple TV?

You have a few different choices when it comes to viewing images on your Apple TV, depending on what you plan to showcase.

• iCloud Photo Library: If you turn on the iCloud Photo Library, you'll stream your entire collection of images and videos to your TV — if you have items in your photo collection you wouldn't want to share on the big screen, keep that in mind.
• iCloud Photo Sharing: You can use this to only share albums you've shared with friends and family (or vice versa).

How to enable iCloud Photo Library

When you turn on the iCloud Photo Library, every image and video you've stored will be available on your TV. This is great if you don't mind people going through your image collection (or you live alone), but keep in mind that if you have guests, you may not want to keep this setting enabled.

1. Tap on the Settings app on your Apple TV.
2. Click Users and Accounts.
3. Choose iCloud under Apple TV Accounts.

4. Click Sign In.
5. Enter your Apple ID and password
6. Toggle on iCloud Photos.

How to enable iCloud Photo Sharing

If you select iCloud Photo Sharing, your Apple TV will have access to any albums you've shared with friends (or they've shared with you). You can use this setting in tandem with iCloud Photo Library or in isolation (if you don't want your entire image library accessible inside your living room).

1. Tap on the Settings app on your Apple TV.
2. Click Users and Accounts.
3. Choose iCloud under Apple TV Accounts.
4. Toggle on Share Albums.

Any questions?

Is there anything else you'd like to know about turning on and using the iCloud Photo Library on Apple TV? Do you have a tip or suggestion? Let us know in the comments.

Updated January 2020: Includes information for tvOS 13.

If you subscribe to Apple's iCloud service and have iCloud Photo Library enabled, you'll have access to your entire photo and video library on any device — even if it can't store those images locally.

The Photos app for iPhone, iPad, and Mac provides easy viewing for images you've taken or saved to your library on your current device, but it also syncs with your larger iCloud Photo Library, where you can view anything you've saved from any device. For me, this means images and video going back to the early 1980s — not too shabby!

But how do you access those images if you have limited storage on your device and don't have Wi-Fi or cellular data readily accessible to pull down an image? The Photos app has your back: You have a number of options for making sure the photos and videos you want to see or edit are still hanging around.

Option 1: Download everything

If you have a small iCloud Photo Library (or a particularly large-capacity iPhone, iPad, or Mac), your simplest option is to turn on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac's "Download and Keep Originals" setting. This will save every image and video from iCloud Photo Library locally on your device, where it will live until you decide otherwise.

• How to optimize your photos storage on your iPhone or iPad
• How to optimize your photos storage on your Mac

While a nice option if you have the storage space, this isn't always possible: Unless you have a 256GB iPhone or iPad — and frankly, even if you do — your full library may take up more space than your device has available, and you can't delete images to free up space lest you also want them deleted from iCloud Photo Library itself.

Option 2: If you want full-resolution photos and editing abilities, download certain photos before you go offline

Prefer to use iCloud Photo Library's Optimize Storage setting? That's fine: You can still download high-resolution copies of your photos and video for viewing or editing while offline.

A quick primer on the "Optimize iPhone Storage" setting: This appropriates a percentage of your free space for photo storage; this percentage fluctuates depending on how much of your storage space you've taken up with other content, as well.

For instance, if you have 5GB of apps on a 64GB iPhone, iCloud might allot 20GB of space to storing Photos, leaving 30GB or so (after operating system space) for other items. If you have 15GB of apps, iCloud's photo allotment might be closer to 10GB.

As your storage ratios change, iCloud Photo Library removes local copies of older photos using semi-intelligent rules (older images, those you haven't viewed in a while, etc) to free up more space.

So, while you can technically download an image from iCloud Photo Library by tapping on it — you'll see a processing icon in the lower right corner of the photo as it downloads — there's no guarantee that image will stay downloaded to your iPhone forever, especially if you don't look at it for awhile.

When deciding what to keep on your device, iCloud Photo Library tends to prioritize the most recent images and videos you've taken. But there's an even easier way to ensure your most recent video shoot is easily accessible: Pause iCloud Photo Library's uploading.

Note: If you pause iCloud Photo Library's upload feature, your most recent photos, and video will not be synced with iCloud or your other devices, and thus won't be backed up anywhere. Use this method at your own risk if you don't have an alternate backup option (like an external drive or other cloud service).

The Optimize Storage feature won't optimize anything iCloud hasn't already backed up; if those images and video aren't backed up, the app won't touch them when considering what to offload.

How to pause iCloud Photo Library sync for the day on your iPhone or iPad

There's one other way to prevent iCloud Photo Library from syncing your images: by turning off cellular support for the Photos app and disabling Wi-Fi for the day. This will prevent your Photos app from uploading any images to iCloud Photo Library via cellular connection; unfortunately, it also means that you won't be able to download any new images over cellular, so this method works best if you don't need your older iCloud images.

How to keep iCloud Photo Library from eating your iPhone's data plan

If you don't want to disable iCloud Photo Library sync but still want to make sure you have the right files, here's the best way of going about it.

1. Create a new photo album on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Add the images and videos you want to view or edit offline.
3. Scroll through the album and download each picture. (Wait until the white circle in the bottom right corner completes before scrolling to the next image or video.)Note: Having trouble downloading your images? iCloud can be persnickety and works best when you're on Wi-Fi and have over 50% battery (with Low Battery mode disabled). If you're continuing to have issues, check out our troubleshooting guide.

Option 3: Don't need to see full-resolution photos or edit images? iCloud has you covered!

If you're bored while on an airplane and want to browse and delete old photos, you don't need internet access: iCloud Photo Library stores low-resolution thumbnails of all your images and video, whether or not their full-resolution counterparts are on your device. When you view one of these, you'll see a slightly pixelated image along with an exclamation point in its lower right corner (indicating the full-resolution file isn't currently accessible).

Note: You'll only see a video's still thumbnail while offline; Apple doesn't cache low-resolution versions of your video clips.

You can view any image from your library in this low-resolution mode while you're offline, though you won't be able to share them or edit them; you can also add files to albums or delete unwanted images, and the app will queue any changes you make to your library to sync up when you next get online.

Questions?

Let us know in the comments.

Updated January 2020: Adjusted for iOS 13. Serenity Caldwell worked on a previous version of this post.

Our photos can be as personal and private as our messages, financial information, and identities. iCloud Photo Library wants to make sure all our pictures and videos are backed up online and available on all our devices. To do that, it moves the bits that make up those pictures and videos from our iPhones, iPads, and Macs up to servers on the internet and then back down to our other iPhones, iPads, and Macs. That means both the transport and the storage needs to be secure so that our content is only ever available to us and us alone.

How does Apple keep my photos secure?

Apple uses strong encryption to keep your photos safe as they move between your devices and iCloud. As Apple notes on its support site, your photos are transmitted under a "minimum of 128-bit AES encryption". This means that your photos are given the same treatment as your iPhone backups, iCloud Drive, and your other iCloud-stored content.

How does encryption keep my photos safe?

On a very basic level, it means that when one of your images is being transmitted (uploaded or downloaded), that photo is protected while it's in transit. This means that if someone were to copy the data for a photo that you were uploading from your iPhone to iCloud while it was being uploaded, they shouldn't be able to see the actual image. Just a bunch of pseudo-random ones and zeroes.

What else does Apple do to keep my photos secure?

Apple employs AES and SHA, industry standards for securely encrypting and hashing data. The company goes further in its iCloud security overview, which offers greater detail on how the company keeps your photos (and all of your data in iCloud) safe:

At a basic level, these standards are very good ways to protect photos and other data while they're being uploaded, downloaded, or stored.

What about privacy?

Apple takes privacy very seriously and, as noted above, stores your data chunks without user-identifying information. The company also gives you options for controlling your own privacy. First, on your iPhone or iPad themselves, it's easy to grant or revoke permission for third-party apps to access your photos.

However, if you've decided that there are images that you don't want to keep around, it's easy to delete them from your iCloud Photo Library. What's really great is that if you want to delete something, you only have to do so on one device. So if you delete an image on your iPhone, it will appear in Recently Deleted not only on that device, but any iPad or Mac connected to that iCloud account.

From there, your photo will remain in Recently Deleted for the next 30 days if you change your mind, or you can choose to completely delete it right away.

Questions?

If you have any other questions about iCloud Photo Library and security, let us know in the comments.

Updated January 2020: This remains the latest information on how iCloud Photo Library keeps your photos and video safe and encrypted.

Apple's iCloud Photo Library makes it possible for you to store all of your photos and videos in iCloud. Once uploaded, you can view them on all of your iCloud-connected devices, as well as via iCloud.com.

My Photo Stream automatically uploads new photos and sends them to all of your iCloud-connected devices. It stores the most recent 30 days' worth of photos (up to 1,000 photos). So what's the difference between them and why would you want to use one over the other? We've got the answers to your questions right here.

• What's the difference between iCloud Photo Library and My Photo Stream?
• What happens to My Photo Stream when you enable iCloud Photo Library?
• How do I access my pictures on Mac and PC with iCloud Photo Library?

What's the difference between iCloud Photo Library and My Photo Stream?

The short and most important answer: My Photo Stream doesn't count against your iCloud storage. That said, it also majorly restricts what you can sync to the cloud and your other devices. Whether that trade-off matters to you depends on your needs.

• Do you have a lot of photos that you want to access across your devices at any time? - You should use iCloud Photo Library to store and access your photos and videos. My Photo Stream only gives you access to your most recent 1,000 photos (or the past 30 days) across your devices.
• Do you have the lowest tier iCloud storage? - If you're still using up less than 5GB of iCloud storage and don't ever want to pay even $0.99 per month for more, you should stick with My Photo Stream. It doesn't count against your iCloud storage capacity. Photos tend to take up a lot of space, and you can easily max out your 5GB of free storage space if you switch to iCloud Photo Library. In fact, you'll probably get a notification as soon as you try to switch asking you to upgrade your storage plan.
• Do you want to sync your videos across all devices? - You definitely need iCloud Library, then. My Photo Stream doesn't support video at all.
• Do you use another photo storage app that works just fine? - If you've already got your cloud-based storage needs taken care of, then you probably don't want to fill up your iCloud storage with another version of the same photos. If you keep your pics and videos in Dropbox or Google Photos, or some other storage app, you could stick with My Photo Stream and only use it on occasion for pics you've recently taken.
• Do you want to access your photos from anywhere you have a web browser? - iCloud Photo Library is the only Apple Photos service that lets you view your entire photo library from anywhere you have internet access and a web browser through iCloud.com.

In short, My Photo Stream is for people that don't take a lot of photos, don't need to access them across all of their devices on a regular basis, or use another cloud storage service to regularly access their photos. It is also for people that refuse to upgrade from the free 5GB iCloud storage tier but have more than 5GB of photos.

iCloud Photo Library is for people that do take a lot of photos and want to be able to view all of their pictures across their devices (including very old ones) and want to stick with the Apple ecosystem. It's for people that are willing to spend at least a dollar every month to have that access. It's for people that also take at least some videos that they want to be able to access on all of their devices. Lastly, it's for people that want to view their photos from any device with a web browser (because icloud.com).

What iCloud storage plan should you get?

What happens to My Photo Stream when you enable iCloud Photo Library?

If you've decided to finally make the switch from My Photo Stream to iCloud Photo Library to share your content across devices, you should know a couple of things before you get started.

When you switch over to iCloud Photo Library, you'll notice that the My Photo Stream album no longer appears on your device. Don't worry: Those photos haven't disappeared. They've just been folded into your "All Photos" section. That's because iCloud Photo Library stores, well ... all your photos. If any of your devices don't have iCloud Photo Library switched on, you'll still see a My Photo Stream album, but once iCloud Photo Library is enabled, that album disappears.

Note: If you have an iPhone or iPad that only uses My Photo Stream, any new photos synced via that service won't upload to iCloud Photo Library — with one exception: if you have iCloud Photo Library enabled on your Mac, it'll automatically grab your My Photo Stream uploads (because they sync to your Mac) and upload appropriately via iCloud. Bottom line: Unless you're trusting your Mac to do the heavy lifting, you should probably enable iCloud Photo Library on all your devices to make sure no images get lost.

Even if you have iCloud Photo Library enabled on all your devices, you can use My Photo Stream to serve a different purpose: A quick-sync method for transferring screenshots and the like ASAP. Because iCloud Photo Library has to upload all your videos and photos in order, it sometimes takes a while for your newest images and screenshots to appear on your other devices. Not so for My Photo Stream: It can skip the video queue and let your recently-snapped screenshots show up on your devices with little delay.

It should also be noted that Apple seems to be phasing out My Photo Stream. In macOS Catalina, the feature is nowhere to be found in the Photos app, and anyone signing up for a new Apple ID won't have access to the feature from the get-go. It is still present in iOS 13 and later, but it seems clear that it's on the way out.

How do I access my pictures on Mac and PC with iCloud Photo Library?

Your pictures are more accessible than ever once you switch to iCloud Photo Library to store them: You can find them in the Photos app on a Mac. And if you're on a PC, you can download and install the iCloud app and find them there. If you're on anyone's computer or phone (or tablet), you can navigate to iCloud.com and sign in to view all of your photos from any web browser.

• How to set up iCloud Photo Library on your Mac
• How to set up iCloud Photo Library on Windows 10
• How to use iCloud Photo Library on iCloud.com

Any questions?

Do you have any questions about the difference between My Photo Stream and iCloud Photo Library? Put them in the comments and we'll help you out.

Updated January 2020: All of this information is up-to-date for the latest version of Photos and iCloud Photo Library, including a note that Apple is phasing out My Photo Stream.

Want to easily back up your iPhone's photos and video, sync them with your other devices, and share them with friends? Apple's iCloud Photo Library service lets you do all that while keeping your storage space free to take even more beautiful 4K video and HDR photographs.

When enabled, the service backs up every photo and video you've snapped or saved to iCloud (assuming you've paid for enough iCloud storage space). Also, it syncs those files across all other iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV, and Apple Watch devices you own and have logged in to that same iCloud account.

iCloud Photo Library will save photos, videos, GIFs, screenshots, and more — and even better, when you enable it, you can use Optimize Storage to send your files immediately to iCloud and keep them from cluttering up your iPhone's local storage space.

Should you use iCloud Photo Library?

Here's how to set up iCloud Photo Library on your iPhone or iPad to back up your photos and video, optimize storage on your devices, and share images with your friends and family.

• How to set up iCloud Photo Library on your iPhone or iPad
• How to quickly sync images with your other devices
• How to optimize your photo and video storage
• How to share photos with iCloud Photo Library

How to set up iCloud Photo Library on your iPhone or iPad

Note: To set up iCloud Photo Library, you must first have an iCloud account.

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap the Apple ID banner at the top of the screen.
3. Select the iCloud option.

4. Tap Photos.
5. Tap the iCloud Photo Library toggle at the top of the screen to turn the service on or off.

How to quickly sync images with your other devices

When you enable iCloud Photo Library, your photos and video will by default automatically upload to iCloud, and eventually sync with your other iOS devices and Macs. If you'd like to expedite this process, however, you can enable My Photo Stream: This will automatically sync any images you take to your other devices when you (and they) are connected to a Wi-Fi network.

iCloud Photo Library vs. My Photo Stream: What's the difference?

It is worth noting that this only works with images: Apple doesn't currently support quick syncing with video files just yet.

Tip: If you frequently swap between your iPhone and iPad and want to use screenshots or photos you've recently taken on either, this is worth enabling.

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap the Apple ID banner at the top of the screen.
3. Select the iCloud option.

4. Tap Photos.
5. Tap the Upload to My Photo Stream toggle to enable instant photo and video sync over Wi-Fi.

If you choose to enable quick sync between your devices in the form of My Photo Stream, you can additionally enable the Upload Burst Photos option to sync every image in a Burst collection; otherwise, iCloud will only sync the Favorite photo from a Burst collection to save space.

How to optimize your photo and video storage

If you routinely shoot lots of 4K video or high-quality images on your iPhone or iPad, you may run out of storage space on your device. (I have a 256GB iPhone, but almost a terabyte of 4K video stored in iCloud — it gets unwieldy, fast!)

Thankfully, Apple offers an Optimize Storage option, which lets you store full-resolution photos and videos of only your most recently shot and accessed imagery; all older photos and videos are available to download via iCloud and are stored as low-resolution previews on your iPhone to save space.

You can switch between optimizing your iPhone's storage or storing your full library locally: Here's how!

Note: If you plan on using Optimize Storage, we suggest having at least one device that stores your entire library locally (usually a Mac with a large local or external hard drive), so you have multiple backups of your photographs and video.

1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tap the Apple ID banner at the top of the screen.
3. Select the iCloud option.

4. Tap Photos.
5. Choose either the Optimize iPhone Storage option or the Download and Keep Originals option.

How to share photos with iCloud Photo Library

Apple's photo service doesn't just provide online backups and sync for your images and video: The company also offers a free sharing service that allows you to send shared albums to friends and family (or create a publicly-shared website). Here's how to turn it on.

How to set up and use iCloud Photo Sharing

Any other questions?

Have a question or comment about getting started with the iCloud Photo Library? Let us know in the comments.

Updated January 2020: Updated with more information about iCloud Photo Library, My Photo Stream, and optimizing your storage. Serenity Caldwell worked on a previous version of this post.