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backup won't backup

hey! iphone12 and it won't backup. I have deleted my backups and I have turned everything to not back up. My next backup size should be 0KB because everything is set to not back up. No apps are set to back up. messages and mail are all set to not back up. photos are set to not back up. documents and data is at 0KB. icloud drive is at 969.5KB icloud is telling me 1.6MB of 5GB used. last backup: never. Backup size: 0KB. BUT - Next Backup Size is set to 5.94 GB. WHY?????? I can not for the life of me figure out what is hiding where that is taking up that much space to back up. Help me! I don't back up much, obviously, but what I do back up I want backed up. And if nothing is set to back up, I am not paying for more storage space.

iPhone 12, iOS 14

Posted on Jul 6, 2021 11:30 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 6, 2021 11:40 AM

cookiecake_ wrote:

hey! iphone12 and it won't backup. I have deleted my backups and I have turned everything to not back up. My next backup size should be 0KB because everything is set to not back up. No apps are set to back up. messages and mail are all set to not back up. photos are set to not back up. documents and data is at 0KB. icloud drive is at 969.5KB icloud is telling me 1.6MB of 5GB used. last backup: never. Backup size: 0KB. BUT - Next Backup Size is set to 5.94 GB. WHY?????? I can not for the life of me figure out what is hiding where that is taking up that much space to back up. Help me! I don't back up much, obviously, but what I do back up I want backed up. And if nothing is set to back up, I am not paying for more storage space.

Read here on what is backed up What does iCloud back up? - Apple Support

7 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 6, 2021 11:40 AM in response to cookiecake_

cookiecake_ wrote:

hey! iphone12 and it won't backup. I have deleted my backups and I have turned everything to not back up. My next backup size should be 0KB because everything is set to not back up. No apps are set to back up. messages and mail are all set to not back up. photos are set to not back up. documents and data is at 0KB. icloud drive is at 969.5KB icloud is telling me 1.6MB of 5GB used. last backup: never. Backup size: 0KB. BUT - Next Backup Size is set to 5.94 GB. WHY?????? I can not for the life of me figure out what is hiding where that is taking up that much space to back up. Help me! I don't back up much, obviously, but what I do back up I want backed up. And if nothing is set to back up, I am not paying for more storage space.

Read here on what is backed up What does iCloud back up? - Apple Support

Jul 6, 2021 12:56 PM in response to cookiecake_

cookiecake_ wrote:

Thanks. I've read through that before and followed everything. I literally have turned off all apps to back up. deleted my back up. neither my photos nor my messages are set to backup. I can find nothing that will be backed up to the icloud.

So, is this article telling me that the phone operations require more than the allotted 5GB backup allowed? So if I have absolutely nothing set to backup, apple still uses too much space to backup to icloud? That seems silly.

And how exactly do you know message and photos aren't part of the backup, you can't turn it off or on, what you're seeing is what you can sync to the cloud in photos and message as outlined here

photo Set up and use iCloud Photos - Apple Support

message Use Messages in iCloud - Apple Support

both of these is already stated in the article you read through.


Also in the article you read through and follow under learn more the last part manage your icloud - did you read through all of that?

Jul 6, 2021 1:53 PM in response to cookiecake_

cookiecake_ wrote:

My name -> iCloud -> 1.6 MB of 5 GB used

(everything on that page is toggled off)

My name -> iCloud -> manage storage
icloud 1.6MB used of 5GB
icloud drive -> 969.5 kb
backups -> 0

click ok backups ->
documents and data 0kb
My name iPhone 0 kb

From there, click on my name iPhone ->
Last back up : never (I deleted all backups trying to fix this)
backup size : 0 kb
Next backup size 5.94 GB

under choose data to backup, everything is toggled off.

clearly I’m missing something somewhere. It’s been stuck at 5.94 no matter what I do or delete.


completely close out of settings and do this Force restart iPhone - Apple Support once it boots back up, check it again.

Jul 6, 2021 11:50 AM in response to razmee209

Thanks. I've read through that before and followed everything. I literally have turned off all apps to back up. deleted my back up. neither my photos nor my messages are set to backup. I can find nothing that will be backed up to the icloud.


So, is this article telling me that the phone operations require more than the allotted 5GB backup allowed? So if I have absolutely nothing set to backup, apple still uses too much space to backup to icloud? That seems silly.

Jul 6, 2021 1:11 PM in response to razmee209

Well, I know this because I've deleted all messages and photos from my phone. And deleted my photos from the deleted items folder. And it is still at 5.94 GB for the icloud backup.


Under "Apps using icloud" everything is toggled off. Photos is set to "off" (even though the photos are empty). Messages is toggled off, even though my messages have all been deleted.


Everything under apps using icloud is toggled off.


under "Choose data to backup", the photo library is toggled off and states "No Data" . Every single app listed in this section is toggled off.


So I'm still trying to figure out what, exactly, is set to backup.


So I'm wondering what is backing up, is it just system files? because again, that would be silly to have more system files use the backup space than what is allowed for free.

Jul 6, 2021 1:18 PM in response to cookiecake_

cookiecake_ wrote:

Well, I know this because I've deleted all messages and photos from my phone. And deleted my photos from the deleted items folder. And it is still at 5.94 GB for the icloud backup.

Under "Apps using icloud" everything is toggled off. Photos is set to "off" (even though the photos are empty). Messages is toggled off, even though my messages have all been deleted.

Everything under apps using icloud is toggled off.

under "Choose data to backup", the photo library is toggled off and states "No Data" . Every single app listed in this section is toggled off.

So I'm still trying to figure out what, exactly, is set to backup.

So I'm wondering what is backing up, is it just system files? because again, that would be silly to have more system files use the backup space than what is allowed for free.

apps using icloud is what you sync to icloud not backup.


Under storage, you get color graph of what is being stored/used in icloud what does your say.

Jul 6, 2021 1:50 PM in response to razmee209

My name -> iCloud -> 1.6 MB of 5 GB used


(everything on that page is toggled off)


My name -> iCloud -> manage storage

icloud 1.6MB used of 5GB

icloud drive -> 969.5 kb

backups -> 0


click ok backups ->

documents and data 0kb

My name iPhone 0 kb


From there, click on my name iPhone ->

Last back up : never (I deleted all backups trying to fix this)

backup size : 0 kb

Next backup size 5.94 GB


under choose data to backup, everything is toggled off.


clearly I’m missing something somewhere. It’s been stuck at 5.94 no matter what I do or delete.



backup won't backup

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