My iPad tells me I have used 3.3GB of my free 5GB of iCloud storage, 3GB is photos, but then says I don’t have enough space to back up to iCloud, but looks like there is space of 1.7 GB left. Why can’t I back up?
iPad Air 2, iPadOS 15
Your iPad seemingly has more stored data than your available iCloud storage can accommodate. Your basic 5GB iCloud storage is tiny - being adequate for synchronising data between devices - and very limited file and photo storage.
When you check your used iPad storage, was do you see?
Settings > General > iPad Storage
Yes. A significant proportion of your locally stored data will be included in your backup. The purpose of a backup is to permit the entire device to be restored from the backup.
The elements of you local files that will not be automatically included within your device backup will be your data and files that are not already stored in iCloud, such as your Photo Library - and the installed Operating System.
Other items that won’t be included are your email (unless using a POP3 mailbox) and cached system data.
After you successfully complete a backup to iCloud, you can see a breakdown of data that has been included within the backup:
Settings > [Your Name / AppleiD] > iCloud > Manage Account Storage > Backups > [Backups] This iPad > Show All Apps
From this page, you can deselect/select the elements that will be included in future backups.
The ipad OS system takes 7.7 GB, but I assume the backup doesn’t try and save all of that, I guess I just want the photos to be saved as that is the only place they exist, whereas I thought all my mail, gets saved by hotmail, my messenger history by Meta etc.
It says 35.9 GB of 128GB used. And apps makes up the most. So does that mean iCloud is trying to store all of that?
My iPad tells me I have used 3.3GB of my free 5GB of iCloud storage, 3GB is photos, but then says I don’t have enough space to back up to iCloud, but looks like there is space of 1.7 GB left. Why can’t I back up?
