Mac Photo Library To Icloud
You might logically conclude that Photos always opens the System Photo Library unless otherwise instructed, but the app instead opens the Last Opened library.Screenshot by Matt Elliott/CNETTo choose a different library than the library you last opened, hold down the Option key when launching Photos. You can't merge libraries using Photos; you can only view them separately.If you decide at some point you'd like to pick a different photo library as your default library for Photos, you can do so by going to the General tab of Preferences and click the button Use as System Photo Library.Screenshot by Matt Elliott/CNETIf you are using iCloud Photo Library with the Photos app, it will work only with the System Photo Library. It will open a dialogue window before opening Photos, asking you to Choose Library or Create New. That is, your secondary libraries will not upload photos to iCloud to share across your iOS devices and OS X machines. If you want to get all of your photos and videos in iCloud, however, you can designate another library as your System Photo Library and then enable iCloud Photo Library. Why do i have 2 photo libraries on my mac.
Apple's iCloud Photo Library service works seamlessly to sync and back up your images and video across all of your Apple devices to iCloud — but if you're serious about keeping your irreplaceable photos and video safe, you'll want a redundant (second) backup. Because as they always say, you can never have too many backups! And it's better to be safe than sorry, honestly.
Backing up your photos can take the form of a local backup on your own drive or an external source, a secondary online backup, or both. Here's how to do it all.
I recently downloaded my entire Google Photos library to my external HDD recently, and plan on adding them all to iCloud. Rather than just adding them all to the Photos app on my mac Mini, I am wondering is there's a way to add them all to iCloud Photos but not use local Mac storage. Is this possible? Sep 24, 2017 Question: Q: iCloud Photo - Two Apple IDs share storage and use iCloud Photo Library? My wife and I each currently have our own Apple ID. Under my Apple ID, I purchased enough storage to turn on iCloud Photo Library on our only Apple Photos library which resides on a MacBook. With iCloud Photo Library, your entire Photos Library is actually stored online, and everything in your Library is also accessible from other Macs and iOS devices like your iPad and iPhone. (Think “central storage house for everything visual that you can reach from anywhere with an Internet connection.”).
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 a 1TB drive or higher. Otherwise, consider backing up to an external drive.
Launch the Photos app on your Mac.
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- Click Photos in the App menu in the upper left corner of your screen.
Select Preferences from the drop-down menu.
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- Click the iCloud tab.
Click Download Originals to this Mac.
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Your Mac will now download full-resolution copies of all your images to your Mac's hard drive, stored inside your Photos app library.
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: by 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.)
Back up your Photos library automatically
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. Whether you use Time Machine or clone your hard drive using SuperDuper! or Carbon Copy, 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!)
Backup Mac Photo Library To Icloud
Back up your Photos library manually
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 at regular intervals.
- Connect an external drive to your Mac via USB, USB-C, or Thunderbolt.
Open a new Finder window on your Mac.
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Click on Pictures in the sidebar.
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Drag your Photos Library to your external drive.
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- Wait for it to copy.
Create an external library for backing up iCloud Photo Library
I recommend setting a bi-weekly reminder for these steps, so you keep your Photos library regularly backed up.
How to back up portions of your iCloud Photo Library
Don't want to back up your entire library? You can export individual images and videos to your external drive.
- Connect an external drive to your Mac via USB, USB-C, or Thunderbolt.
Open the Photos app.
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- Select the photos and video you want to back up.
- Go to the File menu.
Hover over the Export Mac where do i find library. option.
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Select either Export # Photos or Video or Export Unmodified Original for # Photos or Videos.
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Select an option for File Name and Subfolder Format, and then input your text as desired.
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Press Export.
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- Choose your external drive.
- Press Export Originals.
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.
If you store your entire iCloud Photo Library on your Mac
Good news: If you already use a service to back up your hard drive and you've synced your full iCloud Photo Library to your Mac, it's easy to back it all up. (If not, consider it a good time to start!)
If you don't store your iCloud Photo Library on your Mac
If you don't store your iCloud images locally, this is a bit trickier: you can use the external drive method to export portions of your library to an external drive, 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.
Any iCloud Photo Library backup questions?
Have any questions about how to back up your iCloud Photo Library, or about backups or iCloud Photo Library in general? Drop them in the comments below!
March 2020: These are still the proper steps to back up your iCloud Photo Library
Serenity Caldwell contributed to an earlier version of this guide.
iCloud Photo Library: The Ultimate Guide
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