How to free up space on iPhone AND keep iCloud Data

iCloud and especially iCloud Photo Library are synchronization services, not backup and not archive. If you use icloud for your photos, there is no way to delete them from the device and not have those deletions sync to iCloud.

You will need to archive your photos somewhere else first before you can delete them from the phone. You could use other online services like google or Dropbox. Or, just import them to your computer (e.g. Photo's software library in OS X).

Apple has always recommended keeping independent backups or archives even when using their iCloud photo syschrinization services. iCloud Photo Library - Apple Support

To free up some space, you can do any or all of the following.

From the screen that you took the screenshot from above, you can select apps such as WhatsApp, Google Maps, Messenger etc, delete them, and then reinstall them form the App Store. That will get rid of all the junk that apps such as these accumulate each time you use them.

You should also check that you have Optimise iPhone Storage selected, by going to Settings > Photos & Camera.

You also said that you use iCloud to store your photos, so once you've ensured that your iCloud Photo Library is on, and you're optimising your iPhone storage, the other thing I would recommend is erasing all the content and settings from your phone, and then setting it up again.

To do this, make an iCloud backup of your phone, and once that's done, go to Settings > General > Erase All Content and Settings. You'll have to sign out of Find My iPhone first.

Then re-start your phone like you did when you first bought it, but don't set it cup as a 'New iPhone', instead restore it from your most recent iCloud back-up. That will give you as much free space as possible in your 16Gb iPhone. Your photos will sync back onto your phone from your iCloud Photo Library, but will take a little time to do so depending on your wi-fi connection. Goes without saying of course, make sure you're on a stable wi-fi connection to do all of the above.

An iCloud backup is a backup. But working data files in iCloud storage (so, iCloud photo library, documents in pages, numbers, notes, your contacts, etc) are NOT independent archives in iCloud. They are merely copies, synchronized to the local copies on your devices and any changes made on any device using that icloud account will be sync'd, via iCloud, across all devices. That includes deleting, say, a photo on your phone or iPad, which in turn deletes it from iCloud.

In IT there is indeed a clear distinction between a backup, an archive and a synchronized copy. Backups and archives are stored independently of the original precisely so that any and all changes to the original have no affect on the archive or backup versions. While a real time synchronized copy in a cloud storage system is not an independently stored item, and changes quickly migrate across all sync'd copies and devices.

If you use iCloud Photo Library, then your photos are NOT in your iCloud backup. They are sync'd via iCloud and anything that is sync'd via iCloud is NOT included in an iCloud backup.

If you want to keep your photos and delete them from your phone then you first need to transfer those photos to a labtop or Desktop, or upload them into an online archive like Dropbox.

If you do not use iCloud Photo Library, your photos will be in your iCloud backup, BUT the only way to ever see them again would be to restore that entire backup to your phone. So again, you really need to move them to safe storage on a laptop or desktop or online archive.

Apps themselves are not backed up at all and take zero storage in your iCloud account. Apps are available for redownload from the App Store, so it would be pointless to have every user also backing them up in their iCloud space.

App data gets backed up, but not the apps themselves.

iCloud storage is not a 'backup'

mascaritas wrote:

I was assuming that the apps themselves are not uploaded to iCloud ,

No, they are already there.