Delete Photos Just Off iPhone, Not iCloud

techgeekguru wrote:

I totally agree with you. What is the point of having an icloud storage if I cannot delete the pics from my phone to save space and still have to keep them??? it defeats the whole purpose of icloud. Apple needs to find a feasible solution to this problem.

The purpose of iCloud is to keep all your photos in sync across all of your devices. It is not designed to be simple storage. You might wish that Apple had made a different choice but they didn't. If you want cloud storage that will allow you to delete the photos from your device but keep the store on the cloud servers, consider Google Photo.

You can also submit your feedback to Apple here:

http://www.apple.com/feedback

lohmdj1 wrote:

And what if you already have photos on the phone that you want to save, but want to take off the phone to make room for more?

Stop using iPhoto (cloud) Library and use one of the other cloud storage/backup options. (e.g., I use Box.)

Copy your photos to a thumb drive or external HD.

And you're telling me this because...?

If you have submitted 100s of times, then you know Apple will not answer here. having said that, I will suggest some of the iOS 11 changes coming in the fall were as a result of customer feedback.

A filesystem of sorts. Shared iCloud storage.

since years go by and the same dumb bugs are still there.

Perhaps it's time to move on.

No one at Apple can talk to normal people so that they can understand how to use their iPhone and Macbook Pro efficiently. That's sad.

I followed the directions on my cell phone to Optimize photo storage and it does nothing.

The FACT IS, I have so many photos on my iPhone that are already stored on iCloud it's eating up my cell phone space making my iPhone USELESS ... I have to consider buying another phone just so I can use other options ...

But maybe that's the point. They want me to spend money not find ways to make their products work for me.

What I did was something a bit different...I emailed the photos from my iPhone to myself...put them on my desktop and then dragged them to a Photo album where I wanted those photos. Then I deleted them on my iPhone and those photos that I wanted to save were still there in the Photo album.

This is eactly, 100% how I feel. Cloud storage "should" take the burden off the user from having to store content on their device. It does not presently do that in any type of seamless fashion. Google is far more progressive than Apple in this realm. It feels like Apple is forcing its customers to pick up a new device every 1.5 years just to enjoy normal usage. It's a shame.

The only reason I bought extra icloud storage was precisely for this reason. I now have loads of EMPTY icloud storage but I am unable to send my photos to the cloud and delete them from the phone. If there is a way to do this, it is not very obvious as I have wasted hours trying to figure out how to keep photos in icloud storage as well as DELETE them to free up space o n my iPhone. Apple makes life simple in so many other ways. Why is this so complicated?

anndorie wrote:

The only reason I bought extra icloud storage was precisely for this reason. I now have loads of EMPTY icloud storage but I am unable to send my photos to the cloud and delete them from the phone. If there is a way to do this, it is not very obvious as I have wasted hours trying to figure out how to keep photos in icloud storage as well as DELETE them to free up space o n my iPhone. Apple makes life simple in so many other ways. Why is this so complicated?

It’s only complicated if you try to make it do something it wasn’t designed to do. You want cloud storage. Apple‘s system is not that. It’s designed to keep everushing in sync across all of your devices. It does that very simply and easily.

Google Photos will do what you want.

Since this still seems to be a fairly active post and in reading through the thread I'm still at a loss, here is my dilemma:

I LOST MY PHONE

My phone has said it's Offline since I lost it and I'm worried that clicking that Erase iPhone button on Find My iPhone is going to remove everything I have synced in the iCloud. Is it safe to assume, based off how the iCloud works that this would in fact be the result?

If so, what the **** am I supposed to do to protect my privacy on my lost phone AND keep my synced info?

Erasing the phone will not result in losing iCloud content. The erase function just trashes the encryption key, making the phone's contents unreadable. It does not methodically go through apps and delete content.

There is NO WAY to both delete photos from iPhone and also save to iCloud, yet another example that demonstrates how fully incompetent the iCloud team is. Apple literally forces its users to go to their competitor. Amazon's photo-sharing app is perfect if one wants to store photos in the cloud and also delete from their iPhone.

There is NO WAY to both delete photos from iPhone and also save to iCloud

Yes, that's exactly the way that most of us want it and furthermore, we also don't want to have to fiddle or even think about settings that will change it to the way you want it. If you don't like the Apple way, choose another service, there are plenty out there. You already mention Amazon, use it then, I wouldn't entertain it, so we would both be happy if you did.

A smart and well thought out product would automatically sync your files to iCloud, with the ability to "save" the files in iCloud so that one can delete images on their iPhone to free up space. The fact that one cannot both save files to iCloud and delete from their iPhone only exemplifies the utter incompetence and arrogance of the Apple team and their fanboys.

kaolynfromboulder wrote:

A smart and well thought out product would automatically sync your files to iCloud, with the ability to "save" the files in iCloud so that one can delete images on their iPhone to free up space. The fact that one cannot both save files to iCloud and delete from their iPhone only exemplifies the utter incompetence and arrogance of the Apple team and their fanboys.

Or, to phrase it another way, "Anything I don't agree with is bad".

It is very well thought out. And documented. iCloud is a syncing service. All devices logged in to the account can sync contacts, calendars, bookmarks, Wi-Fi passwords, app passwords, phone history, notes, reminders, news preferences, Apple Home access, Health data, Wallet, Game Center, Siri options - and photos. If photos worked any other way they would be the sole exception to the sync model. If you delete a contact, it is deleted from all devices. Likewise for calendars, notes, reminders...and photos. Perfectly logical.

There are plenty of cloud storage services that don't sync: Google, Amazon, upthere.com, dropbox, box.com, shutterfly. So if you don't want to sync use one of them. There are no full syncing services like iCloud. Why do you think Apple should simply duplicate what is already available?