In Settings, select 'Manage device storage'. One of the best things about Google Photos is that you can use it to free up space on your device. This is especially useful if you only want to sync your camera roll. Notably, Android devices have additional options, including the ability to select specific image folders that you want to backup. You’ll need to provide the app with permissions, such as access to your photo library. If you previously didn’t set up automatic backup and sync, you can activate it by going to the account control screen. Because you’re reading this article, we’ll assume you want to do this, so follow the on-screen prompts. When you first launch the app, it will ask you to turn on automatic backup and syncing too. For example, you can upload photos over Wi-Fi and mobile data, but prevent videos from uploading until you connect to Wi-Fi. Users can also implement different settings for photo and video uploads. However, if your mobile plan provides large amounts of data, you can override this and upload photos and videos on Wi-Fi and mobile networks. We recommend only allowing uploads on Wi-Fi (the default option) since uploads can quickly chew through your mobile data plan. When you first sign in, you can decide whether to back up original or high quality images, as well as whether to enable uploads when your device isn’t connected to Wi-Fi. If any photos were previously tied to your account, they should appear automatically. Once it’s installed, log in with your Google account. To get started, just download the Google Photos app from Google Play or the Apple App Store for free. Uploading images from an iOS or Android smartphone or tablet is incredibly easy. Use the Google Photos apps for iOS and Android to upload photos from mobile devices (Image credit: Google Photos) Google Photos: How to back up photos from a phone or tablet

Benefits include the ability to share data with family members, priority customer support, and discounts on items purchased from the Google Store (3% for the 200GB plan and 10% for the 2TB plan). The 2TB plan will set you back only $9.99 (or $99.99 for the year). 200GB costs only fractionally more at $2.99 a month, or $29.99 a year.

The 100GB plan costs $1.99 a month, or $11.99 a year. There are three plans providing 100GB, 200GB, and 2TB of data respectively, and for each, paying annually saves you 16%

If you need more Google Cloud storage, you can sign up for a Google One subscription. Original quality photos and videos do count against your 15GB limit, and remember that this limit is shared among all Google services, from Photos to Drive and Gmail. Keep in mind that you can back up RAW image files, but check Google’s support documentation to see what types of RAW files are supported. In that case, select original quality, which will upload the full-size image. If you’re shooting with a DSLR or thinking about printing photos, though, you might not want any compression. Note that Photos also accepts videos, and high quality uploads are stored in 1080p, which is already the maximum resolution at which many cameras are capable of recording. They don’t count towards the 15GB of free cloud storage you get with a Google account, so you can store as many images as you want. The advantage is that these backups are completely free.

Google’s compression is very efficient, especially for JPG image files. If you’re uploading from a smartphone, you likely won’t notice any drop in image quality. When you select high quality backup, Google will compress images slightly before transferring them. Google One offers a range of pricing plans for different storage levels (Image credit: Google)īefore you start backing up images to Google Photos, it’s important to understand the difference between high and original quality backups.

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