Is there (yet) any way to download entire folders from icloud.com as a zip file?
I am aware of this thread that already posed this question, but as far as I can tell there is still no answer.
I've gotten myself mired in a situation where I have a huge amount of my work files on iCloud Drive and it's becoming completely unusable. My Mac's drive is full and iCloud Drive is constantly moving files into the cloud. It is transferring data constantly, using up a ton of bandwidth. Files I need to access -- even small ones -- take several minutes to download as the Mac is already hung up on other iCloud Drive file transfers.
THIS is why I want a way to download my files as a zip. I just need to get a complete archive of what I have in iCloud Drive so I can store it elsewhere.
Other cloud storage services like Google Drive and Dropbox let you download folders as a zip file. There are plenty of reasons other than what I'm describing where someone might need to do this. For instance, what if I'm visiting my parents without my laptop and I need to access a work project from their computer? If I'm trying to work with a bunch of nested folders, downloading each file individually is not feasible.
(I say this to stave off the inevitable confrontational "Why would you want to do that anyway?" response questions like this always seem to elicit. Just because you don't have a reason, or haven't encountered a particular situation, doesn't mean it can't happen for someone else.)
I plan to submit feedback to Apple asking for this feature, but I am also posting this here just hoping against hope that maybe there's a way to do this that I haven't figured out. Because right now I'm resorting to sitting with a Finder window open to iCloud Drive, watching for folders whose cloud icons go away, copying them to an external SSD, deleting them from iCloud Drive to free up local space, repeat. There has got to be a better way.
MacBook Pro w/ Touch Bar (2018 or later)