How to remove photos from icloud without deleting them

How Do I Turn off iCloud without Losing Photos

Table of Contents Show

What Happens to Photos If you Turn off iCloud?
How to Turn off iCloud Photos without Deleting Everything
Step 1. Backup Your Photos
Step 2. Turn off iCloud Photos
Final Words
How can I delete photos from iCloud without losing them?
What happens if I remove my photos from iCloud?
Can I delete photos from iCloud but keep them on my phone?
How do you get pictures off of iCloud?

My iCloud storage is full and I don't need photo & video synchronization. So I want to turn off iCloud Photos and store everything just on my device.
But when I'm trying to turn off iCloud Photos it says all media will be deleted from my iPhone as well. How can I turn off iCloud without losing photos?

- Question from Apply Community

iCloud provides an easy way to help us backup and sync data across all devices. However, the free storage space is limited and now you find that your iCloud is full of photos and videos.

You want to turn off iCloud Photos on iPhone to get rid of the message telling you iCloud Storage is Full, but you definitely do not want to lose your photos. After all, these photos are your precious memories. Don't worry too much, you will know how to turn off iCloud photos without deleting everything in this article.

★Tips:You can try to delete duplicate photos on iCloud to free up space.If you accidentally delete some photos, you can go to iCloud.com to restore deleted photos in the last 30 days from Recently Deleted album.

What Happens to Photos If you Turn off iCloud?

When you understand how iCloud Photos works, you'll know how to turn off iCloud Photos without deleting photos.

As long as your devices use the same iCloud account and iCloud Photos is enabled, iCloud Photos will save all photos and videos uploaded from all your devices. When you turn off iCloud Photos on iPhone or iPad, it will only remove photos from the device, the original photos are still in iCloud. There are two options for you to choose from if you want to turn off iCloud photos without losing pictures:

● Choose to remove iCloud photos from device and you can go to iCloud.com to check your photos.
● Choose to download iCloud Photos so that you can check them on your device offline.

When you turn off iCloud Photos on a single device, you can also check your photos on other devices as usual. For example, you can turn off iCloud Photos on iPad only to remove photos from iPad but keep on iPhone.

How to Turn off iCloud Photos without Deleting Everything

If you do not have much space left on your iPhone/iPad, you can backup your photos and then turn off iCloud Photos without having to worry about losing anything.
If you have enough local space to download iCloud photos on iPhone/iPad, you can skip down to Step 2 to see how to turn off iCloud Photos without deleting photos.

Step 1. Backup Your Photos

Before turning off iCloud Photos, it is recommended to backup your photos and videos first. In this way, you won't have to worry about losing important pictures due to incorrect operation.

You can go to iCloud.com to download them to computer or let transfer tool help you export photos from iPhone/iPad to computer. In addition, you can also choose to upload photos from iPhone to Google Photos, Dropbox, OneDrive or other cloud storage services.

Download Photos from iCloud.com

1. Open a browser and go to iCloud.com on your computer.

2. Login with your Apple ID and passcode to enter your iCloud account.

3. Choose Photos option and then you will see all photos & videos in iCloud.

4. Download photos to your computer.

Transfer Photos from iPhone/iPad to Computer

If you have a poor network connection, you can choose to transfer photos from iPhone/iPad to computer via USB cable. One easy-to-use iOS data transfer tool called FoneTool can do you a favor. The tool will display all your iPhone photo albums so that you can easily find the photos you want to transfer.

1. Download, install and launch FoneTool.

2. Connect your iPhone to computer and Trust FoneTool.

3. On the home interface, choose iPhone to PC option.

4. Choose Photos and select the pictures you want to transfer.

5. Select a path from Transfer Settings to save your photos and click Start Transfer to transfer full resolution photos from iPhone to computer.

Now that your photos are safely stored on your computer, you can turn off iCloud Photos without losing pictures.

Step 2. Turn off iCloud Photos

Go to Settings app app > Tap [your name] > Tap iCloud > Tap Photos > Turn off iCloud Photos. Then you will receive a prompt along with two options:

Remove Photos from iPad/iPhone - Quickly delete all iCloud photos & videos from your device.
Download Photos & Videos - Save all iCloud photos & videos on your device. Please make sure you have enough local space, otherwise, the download will fail due to insufficient storage.

Notes:✎...If you are running out of space on your iOS device, you can enable Optimize iPhone Storage option to reduce the amount of space the photos take up. In this way, then your iPhone will only store thumbnails on your device while the original photos & videos are saved on iCloud.

Final Words

That’s all about how to turn off iCloud Photos without deleting everything. Turning off iCloud Photos will not affect photos sorted in iCloud, but we recommend backing up your photos before turning it off to prevent any accidents.

When iCloud Photos is turned off, your photos won't be backed up to iCloud anymore. Do not forget to backup your photos to PC, external hard drive, USB flash drive or other cloud storage services.

How can I delete photos from iCloud without losing them?

To delete photos from iCloud on your synced iPhone, just open the Photos app and delete them. You can also delete photos from iCloud on the iCloud website. To delete photos on iCloud but not on your iPhone, you'll have to turn off iCloud Photos syncing.

What happens if I remove my photos from iCloud?

When you delete a photo or video from Photos on iCloud.com, it's also deleted from all your devices that have iCloud Photos turned on. If you change your mind, you have 30 days to recover it before it's permanently removed.

Can I delete photos from iCloud but keep them on my phone?

If you want to delete photos from iCloud but keep them on your iOS devices, make sure to disable iCloud Photos first. Go to Settings -> Apple ID (your name at the very top) -> iCloud -> Photos -> Toggle off “iCloud Photos”. Now, when you delete photos from iCloud, they will stay on your iPhone.