HT204476: Photos saves disk space by sharing images with your iPhoto or Aperture libraries

Learn about Photos saves disk space by sharing images with your iPhoto or Aperture libraries
senorlevine

Q: iPhoto library is very large.

This article talks about saving space. My iPhoto library is 63GB but the Photos library is only 22GB. Is it still safe to delete my iPhoto library?

MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch,Early 2015), OS X El Capitan (10.11.5)

Posted on Jul 8, 2016 7:16 AM

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Q: iPhoto library is very large.

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  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Jul 8, 2016 9:35 PM in response to senorlevine
    Level 10 (84,210 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Jul 8, 2016 9:35 PM in response to senorlevine

    Yes if everything is good and available in your Photos library - deleting the iPhoto library has no effect of any sort on Photos

     

     

    LN

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Jul 9, 2016 2:18 AM in response to senorlevine
    Level 10 (105,761 points)
    iLife
    Jul 9, 2016 2:18 AM in response to senorlevine

    This article talks about saving space. My iPhoto library is 63GB but the Photos library is only 22GB. Is it still safe to delete my iPhoto library?

    That is a big difference in size.  Did you delete photos from your Photos Library after you migrated the iPhoto Library to Photos? Did you check for any missing photos?

     

    The difference in size may be caused by the "Optimize Storage" option.  Are you using iCloud Photo Library and "optimize storage"?  Then there will be no local copies of your original image files an your Mac; the originals will only be in iCloud", and I would not delete the iPhoto Library without making a backup of the library on an external drive. Unless you already made a backup copy of all your original image files on a backup drive. With "Optimize storage" you will have no backup of your photos, since Time Machine cannot backup the originals in iCloud.  It would be risky, if the originals in iCloud were your only copies of our photos.