Merge photos from two Apple IDs

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Merge photos from two Apple IDs

I have 2 Apple IDs - one is my regular email address and the other is an iCloud address established years ago. I just got a new phone and have come to understand that of my nearly 6000 photos, all but 200 are on the iCloud address login which I never use. So if I’m logged in with my regular email address, I can only see those 200. I have to log out and log back in with the iCloud address in order to see the full 6000. Is there some way to merge them into the preferred Apple ID?

Posted on Oct 31, 2026 8:22 AM

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Answer 1

Oct 31, 2026 8:58 AM in response to Hoosier737

Sign out of your current Apple Account on the device and sign in with your old Apple Account.
Then, go to Settings > Apps > Photos > iPhone Storage, and change that to Download and Keep Originals. It will take a bit of time to download those photos to your device and you will need phone storage space to do that. You should be able to see the status of the download in the Photos app or Settings.
Once complete, sign out of that Apple Account and sign in again with your new one. You should then have all of your old photos and your new ones syncing to your new iCloud account. Again it will take a bit of time for those 6000 photos on your device to be uploaded to iCloud.

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