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Photos | delete from iPhone but keep in iCloud - how?

I have backed up my photos from my iPhone to iCloud but now I need to delete them from my iPhone. I don't want them on my iPhone. I am going on vacations and I want to start fresh with no photo. How to I delete them from iPhone without deleting them from iCloud?

tx Sophia


Posted on Jun 15, 2022 6:50 PM

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Posted on Jun 15, 2022 7:04 PM

You cannot do so. iCloud photo is explicitly a synchronization service. It sync’s photos across devices (including deletions). You cannot make changes of any kind in the device and not have them included in iCloud photo.


To keep photos and delete them from your device you must archive them somewhere else - a home computer hard drive or some other online archival storage like DropBox or Google.

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Question marked as Best reply

Jun 15, 2022 7:04 PM in response to SophiaFrenchie

You cannot do so. iCloud photo is explicitly a synchronization service. It sync’s photos across devices (including deletions). You cannot make changes of any kind in the device and not have them included in iCloud photo.


To keep photos and delete them from your device you must archive them somewhere else - a home computer hard drive or some other online archival storage like DropBox or Google.

Photos | delete from iPhone but keep in iCloud - how?

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