What happens when I turn off iCloud Photos and then turned on again?

Photos in the Recently Deleted folder will be removed after a month. Other photos in iCloud will remain there forever. When you turned it off did you say to delete the photos from your phone, or to keep them?

When you turn iCloud Photos back on they will download from iCloud, but only when you have a Wi-Fi connection, and the amount of time this will take depends on your connection speed.

You can check that they are in iCloud by logging in to https://www.icloud.com/#photos

Yes I am logged in with the same account. I can see ~3000 pics on iCloud in my browser; these pics were on my phone before I turned icloud off by mistake.

When I selected Download and Keep Original, I didn’t see any pics coming into my Photos app. However, a few hours later, I got a notification saying that I’m running out of iphone storage. And when I deselected Download and Keep Original, the notification went away.

So my assumption is:

• Before I turned off iCloud by mistake, I had all those 3000 pics on my phone. They weren’t taking up that much iPhone storage because I had Optimize iPhone Storage selected.

• When I turned off iCloud, all the pics got deleted from my phone (along with other files in my Files app).

• When I turned iCloud back on, all my other files came back, but my pics didn’t. Now if I want my pics back, I have to select Download and Keep Original. However, this would mean that all 3000pics are downloaded to my iPhone, which my iPhone storage can’t afford.

If I am correct, my question for you is:

is there a way I can get the pics back in my Photos app by keeping the Optimize iPhone Storage setting On?

If there isn’t a way, maybe I can try:

1. deleting all my other files/apps from my to clear up enough storage to download the pics on my phone.
2. Then I select Download and Keep Original.
3. Once the pics are downloaded on my phone, I go in Settings and select Optimize iPhone Storage to clear up storage for my files/apps.
4. Finally, redownload the files/apps back on my phone.

Hi Lawrence,

I did the the same mistake as Hunter: turned it off by mistake. However, I don't remember what option I picked when it asked me 'Delete Photo' or 'Keep Them'.

I can see the photos on my iCloud account in web browser, but I would like to have them back in my iPhone's Photo app as well. How can I do it?

Thanks.

Go to Settings/<your name>/iCloud - Photos and turn it on. The photos should sync back to your phone. It really doesn't matter if you choose to keep or delete; it's smart enough to no duplicate photos as long as you didn't change the names of the photos while it was off.

Are you logged in to the same Apple ID in both your web browser and your phone? You might try turning on download and keep originals.

I just noticed that you are in low power mode and not connected to Wi-Fi. You need to charge the phone and either connect to Wi-Fi or enable cellular data for the photos app.

That should work. Just turn off syncing of the other files, download the photos, switch to Optimize, then turn the syncing for the other files back on. But turn them on one at a time so the photo app can do its work.

I did try that but my Photos app is still empty. Do you know what could cause it? Here are my settings (attached).

I did the same. How did you turn it back on?? I am one day from deletion.

Settings/<Your name>/iCloud - Photos: ON