By at present, you lot've virtually certainly heard how good Google Photos is. Your friends, family, and coworkers are probably using information technology and singing the app's praises. It makes backing up your photo library effortless. Information technology can identify people — fifty-fifty babies — in your images with freakish accuracy. It automatically creates GIFs and movies that the people in your life will cherish. Hooray.

Only there'southward really no dandy manual or user guide for Google Photos. Google's FAQ site is about as close every bit the company comes to a "getting started" handbook. Then I've compiled some how-tos and tips here and plan to update this article to keep up with any big changes that Google makes to the app.

MOVING TO GOOGLE PHOTOS

Few tasks feel as daunting every bit transferring your unabridged photo library from one service to another. And few things feel worse than accidentally losing images or videos that you tin can't supervene upon. And so equally bully as Google Photos might be, switching to it won't be a small undertaking for everyone.

Apple Photos: If all of your pictures and videos are on your phone or Mac, this should be relatively straightforward. Just install Google Photos app on your iPhone or the desktop app for your Mac. On iOS, Photos will automatically commencement backing upwardly your photo library. On Mac, you'll need to point information technology to the folder where your photos are stored.

There's just i potential snag to exist enlightened of if y'all're using Apple tree'southward iCloud Photo Library. Depending on your settings, some of your images could be in the cloud and visible on your devices — but not actually stored on them. This might be the case if you lot got tired of warnings virtually low storage on your phone and decided to purchase more infinite with iCloud. If you're using iCloud Photo Library, Google Photos might be unable to run across or upload your photos and videos. The easiest solution is to make certain every file is actually saved on your smartphone or computer. To do that, just enable the options below:

  • iOS: Settings > [your name at the superlative of the screen] > iCloud > PhotosSelect "Download and Go along Originals"
  • Mac: Open up Photos app. Cull Photos > PreferencesSelect "Download Originals to this Mac"
  • Windows: Apple explains how to download iCloud photos to your PC here.

Flickr: Glenn Fleishmann put together a thorough step-by-step guide at Macworld for relocating from Flickr to Google Photos. I wish I could say it's a quick, easy procedure, but that'southward not the case. It takes some work to bring everything over — peculiarly if you want to save things like paradigm titles, descriptions, and other details that some photographers will insist on preserving.

Glenn goes the manual route using Flickr'south own consign process, which is certain to exam your patience since it involves downloading multiple, large zip archives of your entire Flickr library to a PC or Mac. You might be able to find 3rd-political party apps that can help with that backbreaking pace. Pictogo is 1 I've had some success with on macOS. Once you've got all the files, using the Google Photos desktop app to send them to their new home in the cloud is the piece of cake part. Thankfully, Google Photos makes it painless to edit critical data for photos (ie. when they were taken) in example some of that gets lost during the motility.

My best advice is this: tough information technology out. Don't let the deplorable procedure make y'all carelessness the entire mission. You lot'll only have to do this once. Endure the grunt piece of work and be done with it.

Windows / Mac: If you're got a traditional photograph library (folders upon folders), the Google Photos desktop uploader should get the job washed fairly well.

Google Photos on the Google Pixel Photo past Vlad Savov / The Verge

CHOOSE WHAT TO Support, WHEN, AND AT WHAT QUALITY

Google Photos automatically backs upwardly the pictures and videos you capture with your smartphone. When you starting time set up the app, you'll be given two choices on backup quality: optimized or original. Optimized is an enticing selection since it offers unlimited storage for costless. And information technology'due south a fine choice if you plan on sharing your images mostly online — via email, on social media, etc.

But if you're a semi-serious photographer, potentially run across yourself making a photo book, or simply desire to archive everything without whatever quality degradation, it's best to choice "original." Yet, original backups will eat into your Google account storage, so you'll likely need to upgrade at some point to get more than room in the cloud for your library. Past default, Google accounts come with 15GB of storage.

The backup options in Google Photos are pretty flexible.

Google Photos gives you lot enough of flexibility nearly when backups occur. You can tell the app to only back upwards over Wi-Fi if yous need to exist careful about using as well much data on your phone. Google Photos can also be set to only exercise backups while your phone is existence charged to minimize any battery drainage. Personally, I've configured Photos to back up pictures at any time with cellular information only to wait for Wi-Fi for video uploads.

Sometimes you might need Google Photos to support more than merely camera roll items, though. You tin can choose which folders — screenshots, downloads, Instagram, etc. — Photos backs upward by going to settings, then "Back up & sync," and so select "Back up device folders" to toggle folders on and off.

If you want to back up an individual photo or video that's in a folder not being synced with Google Photos, y'all tin only do it manually. Open the prototype, tap the three-dot card button in the top correct, and choose "Dorsum up now." You can select multiple items when doing transmission backups, also.

THE HELPFUL, Automated ASSISTANT

I of the best aspects of Google Photos is how much work it does for you automatically — without you doing a thing. Did yous take a weekend trip somewhere? Photos will recognize that those pictures were taken in a specific location and create an album grouping them all together. If yous took a sequence of like images (even if they're not technically "outburst" shots), Photos will often make an animated GIF out of them. It'll also create movies (with a music track), collages, and filtered versions of your shots. Again, this all happens with no work on your office.

These automatic creations show up in the Banana tab, where you're free to either save them to your library permanently or swipe them away if Google fabricated something bad. And yep, sometimes there are misfires. Movies are often imperfect when an algorithm is doing the editing, and Google actually tends to layer on the effects thick when information technology randomly applies a filter to one of your photos. And but like with Facebook, on some days yous'll open Photos and be greeted with photos of an ex or other fragile memories cheers to the "Rediscover this twenty-four hour period" feature.

But more often than not, the Assistant produces really corking stuff that'll cause you a quick burst of emotion. And whether they're rooted in joy, nostalgia, or wistfulness, those surprises get very addicting.

How to hibernate someone in Google Photos:

  1. Tap the search bar
  2. Aggrandize the section with faces of people in your library
  3. Tap and hold on the person you lot don't want to see
  4. Select "Hide" in the upper right corner

One time that'southward washed, Google Photos will avoid surfacing photos featuring that person in "Rediscover this day."

SEARCH IS THE KILLER Feature

If you want to sell someone on Google Photos, show them the app's search powers. You tin do the basics like "selfie" or "photos from last weekend." But the wow factor really hits when you search for specific subjects that Google Photos has identified in each of your shots. From individual people in your life to animals, objects, events ("concerts") and nearby landmarks, Photos can pull up whatever you lot're looking for in a massive library with astonishing speed. Occasionally some odd and not-quite-right results will appear with the good ones, merely search is normally far more than accurate than not.

You can too ask search to show specific types of content within your library like GIFs, 360-degree photos, screenshots, and videos.

Make YOUR Ain GIFS

You're not just limited to the GIFs that Google Photos automatically makes. The app also lets you lot create them with any photos you lot'd similar. Select the sequence of images y'all desire, tap the + icon, choose animation, and you're done. Yous tin can string together whatever photos in your library that you'd like, which allows for a niggling more than inventiveness than a GIF of burst-shot photos.

OR MAKE MOVIES FOR YOUR PARENTS

GIFs might be popular amongst your friends, but your parents and other family members might appreciate the movies feature of Google Photos a little more. They like that stuff. To have the app automatically create a movie, select whatsoever images and videos you want to include, tap the plus button, and pick movie. Movies can merely exist created with the Google Photos mobile app; yous can't yet make them from the spider web.

From there, you can either just go with whatever Google makes or take command and edit things yourself. To change up the style and transitions, tap the clapperboard icon at the lower left of your screen. To switch up the music track, tap the music annotation. And if you lot want to adjust the order of content in the pic — or add or drop images — choose the film strip. Once you're done, you can either share your movie direct or upload it to YouTube for public viewing.

SHARED ALBUMS

If you want to share your shots from a wedding or a political party with other people that attended, Google Photos makes this relatively simple. Select the album that you want to share, tap the share icon, and kickoff inbound their proper noun or e-mail address. Yous can also create a new "Shared Album" and cull whether or not people you share it with will be allowed to contribute to the anthology.

If someone you're sharing with is already a Google Photos user, you'll see the app'southward icon on that person's profile prototype. In this case, you lot tin can cull to share via Google Photos and they'll receive an in-app notification. Otherwise, you can just but share by electronic mail. Recipients must take a Google business relationship to add their own images and videos to a shared album, only anyone with the link can view the album and download photos — even if they're not in Google's ecosystem. In that sense, it's worth using a flake of care with the shared album link. There's no way to assign different permissions to specific people you're sharing with. You tin cake someone'due south Google account to revoke access to any shared album. Next to the person's proper name, tap "More" and then striking the cake option.

Gratuitous UP STORAGE ON YOUR PHONE

As Google uploads your phone's photographic camera roll to the cloud, you might want to erase the copies of those images on your device to complimentary upwards space. Photos makes this adequately simple:

  1. Open up the side menu
  2. Select "Free up space"
  3. Google Photos will know what content has already been backed up and is safety to clear off of your device. Just tap the "remove" push to accept the final stride.

FOLDERS! TURN ON THE PHOTOS FOLDER IN GOOGLE Bulldoze

If for whatsoever reason you lot want or need to dig through the actual folder and file structure of Google Photos, y'all can practise this through Google Bulldoze. Go to Drive, then settings, then check the "Create a Google Photos folder" option and you get... folders. Like this:

Archive THE UGLY STUFF

Google recently added an "archive" characteristic to Photos. This removes images from the primary view of all your photos — only they're still attainable in the Archive binder. Photos volition suggest some stuff to annal (like screenshots) but you tin can use archive for more... sensitive content besides.

SATURATE YOUR SKIES

The built-in editing tools in Google Photos are perfectly adequate if you're making basic touchups. And if cipher else, hitting the "Auto" filter usually does a very nice job of improving the white balance of your prototype.

google photos editing
Google Photos editor

In that location's also a fashion to pump up the blues in your sky photos — without ratcheting upward the saturation of the entire scene. Tap the pencil / edit button, choose the middle icon of setting sliders, and so expand the "color" section. In that location, you'll see a slider for "deep bluish." Movement that up, and your sky photography volition get a a lot more pop. Yous can also use information technology for other blueish subjects, equally well.

Other random tips and tricks:

  • You can alter the look and density of your library as information technology appears on your phone's screen with a pinching gesture. Pinching in will increase the number of images shown on screen at once until you go to a calendar month / year view, while pinching outward will zoom in to brandish just a few photos at a time — but much larger.
  • For the mobile app: if you know when a photograph yous're looking for was taken, information technology's much faster to use the scrubber on the correct side (that appears as y'all coil) to navigate your library. Once you lot grab it and whorl either upwards or downwards, y'all'll see the month and year popular up next to your finger so y'all know when to stop.
  • Yous can tell Google Photos to automatically strip out the location data from images and videos that you share with a link. Get to settings and toggle on "Remove geo location." Google notes that this doesn't remove geolocation data for photos and videos that you lot share "by other means" in the app.
  • Google Photos is the all-time cloud photograph service going today, but if you're not a fan of giving Google and so much of your data, information technology's relatively like shooting fish in a barrel to bond on the whole affair. Just get to Google Takeout and you can cull to download your entire photo collection.

As I mentioned earlier, I plan to update this How-to over time as Google introduces or changes Photos features. If you've got any questions (or if in that location'south something you're dying for Google to add), I'd honey to hear about all of it in the comments.

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