How can I save space on iCloud presently occupied by "Messages" (most likely photos and videos embedded in them) WITHOUT losing my entire history of messages?
I am running out of iCloud space because "Messages" occupies 4.7 GB. I would like to download all photos and videos embedded in messages (preferably in bulk!), so they don't need to be kept on iCloud. But I do NOT want to lose my entire history of messages! In the article, it says that if I turn off iCloud for messages, "your message history will be included in a separate iCloud backup" - but how does that save space? Do I not bump up against the 5 GB limit?
MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 11.6