Only sync photos from one Shared Album with Mac

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Only sync photos from one Shared Album with Mac

Hi everyone!

I have 200GB of photos on my iCloud account: I never delete stuff, and now it's far too big to tackle.

Now I need to use my iPhone for work and editing photos is a big part of it.

I have a Shared Album with a colleague; this works great across our iPhones and iPad, but when it comes to the Mac, I don't want to have to download 200GB of photos. It quickly fills up my Mac storage as I also do music production which takes up a chunk as well.

Does anyone have a suggestion as to how I could have the Photos in that Shared Album sync with my Mac whilst ignoring everything else?

I've tried:

ticking the 'shared albums' box in Photos' Preferences, but iCloud needs to be switched on.
accessing Photos via iCloud.com, but Shared Albums don't appear (can't quite wrap my head around that one!)

I considered having a separate Apple ID for my work (ergo new icloud account with only that Shared Album linked to it), but it's just not practical as all other parts of my work are set up with my existing ID.

A public album isn't possible as they're confidential photos.

Siri Shortcuts, scripts, third party apps, all ideas are welcome.

Thank you!

Posted on May 6, 2022 8:32 AM

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Answer 1

May 7, 2022 1:59 PM in response to jjswin

Hi - A couple of options for you:

1 - Sync with iCloud, but enable "optimise mac storage". Photos will then keep full size images From the 200GB set) only in iCloud, not downloading to the Mac. However - it WILL create thumbnails and previews plus a database on your mac, which could take up to around 20% of the space of the full library.

2 - Use an external drive (directly connected, formatted MacOS extended, or APFS). Put your system library on that, (You'll need to set it as the system library after putting it there), then sync wiht iCloud - then the library is on the external drive, and not taking space on your mac. Downside. the external drive needs to be connected whenever you sign into your mac.

on another note - are you and your colleague aware that shared albums reduce the images size and quality of images put in them? Don't use them as the only storage for your "master" images.

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Answer 2

hc1111

Community Specialist

May 7, 2022 9:08 AM in response to jjswin

Hello jjswin,

If you are looking to set up a separate Apple ID for work purposes and to share a specific photo album, you might want to consider using Family Sharing between your Apple ID accounts to avoid loading your personal photo album.

To learn more about how this works, check out the information and link below:

With Family Sharing, you and up to five other family members can share access to amazing Apple services like iCloud+, Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Fitness+, Apple News+, and Apple Arcade. Your group can also share iTunes, Apple Books, and App Store purchases, and a family photo album. You can even help locate each other’s missing devices.

What is Family Sharing?

All the best.

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Only sync photos from one Shared Album with Mac

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