Cant find photos in icloud???

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Level 1

4 points

Cant find photos in icloud???

Right so about a month ago I decided to do a massive clear out on my iphone 6. I bought extra storage on icloud backed up all my data and started deleting every unnecessary thing off my phone. I deleted close to 3000 pictures off my phone but I believed they were still stored in my icloud library. Now I decided to have a look from my imac and they are not there. Just simply not there. Icloud is only up to date with what I have on my iphone right now which is only about 500 pictures. Where are the rest?? What happened?? Cause when I was done deleting everything I logged into Icloud to check on it and all my pictures and everything were fine. Please help this is really scaring me, I had a lot of memories and this makes me want to cry

iPhone 6

Posted on Dec 9, 2017 2:49 PM

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Answer 1

javaliga

Level 10

119,373 points

Dec 9, 2017 3:31 PM in response to banorsi

Were you using iCloud Photo Library? If so, photos are not stored as part of the backup since they are already in iCloud. See the "How do I delete photos and videos from a device using iCloud Photo Library?" section in:

Get help with your iCloud Photo Library - Apple Support

iCloud, as implemented by Apple, is not simply offline storage. It is a syncing mechanism that keeps photos up-to-date on all your devices. Any edits (including deletes) that you make on one device are also made on all your devices (and in iCloud). See the "Check your Recently Deleted folder" section of:

Get help with missing photos - Apple Support

to recover recently deleted photos. Anything in your Recently Deleted folder stays there for 30 days. After that, it's gone forever.

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Answer 2

FoxFifth

Level 10

468,633 points

Dec 9, 2017 3:32 PM in response to banorsi

Sorry but iCloud Photo Library is a syncing service. Any photo you delete from a device where iCloud Photo Library is turned on will also be deleted from iCloud and from any other device connected to that iCloud Photo Library. You can potentially reduce the storage space required on a device by turning on Optimize Storage. See: iCloud Photo Library - Apple Support

Deleted photos are kept in the Recently Deleted album in the Photos app (both on the device and on iCloud) for approximately a month so you should check to see if they are still there.

Apple does not currently offer cloud-only storage for photos. If that is what you want or need, you may want to explore 3rd party options such as Google Photos or Dropbox.

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