Google Drive and Photos are two similar but different products for storing photos and videos. Google offers a native option to sync files in both while you can also add images and videos. It seems convenient, but a bit complicated.
Once you’ve connected Drive and Photos, it’s not easy to delete synced photos from either. If you remove a synced image from one platform, Google will remove it from both platforms.
Yes, you read that right. So, in this post, we will cover the scenario where you can only delete photos and videos from Google Drive without deleting the same files from Google Photos.
Start.
Case 1: Upload photos from Google Drive app
If you upload photos and videos to the Drive app, Google counts them as part of your total Google Drive storage. Unless you sync them with Google Photos by enabling the ‘Sync photos and videos from Google Drive’ setting in the app, the images and videos won’t show up there.
Once you do that, it becomes difficult to delete those synced photos. As noted earlier, deleting a photo from one platform will also remove it from the other.
To remove only photos from Drive and not from Google Photos, you need to add those photos to your Google Photos Album (steps below). When you do that, Google will treat those images as part of Photos. You can then safely delete it from Google Drive without worrying about their presence in Google Photos.
Add photos to Album
To add photos to a Google Photos album, follow these steps:
Step 1: Launch the Photos app and in the Photos tab, open the synced photos from Google Drive.
Step 2: Tap the three-dot icon in the upper right corner and select Add to album from the menu.
Step 3: Create a new album by tapping New Album or add it to an existing album.
Step 4: Access the newly created album from the Albums tab.
Alternatively, tap New Album in Albums and add more photos to it.
In a nutshell, here’s what happens:
- Remove photos from Drive — Deleted from anywhere.
- Removed from Google Photos — Removed from everywhere.
- Add photos to Google Photos Albums and remove them from Drive — Removed from Google Drive only.
- Add photos to Google Photos Albums and remove them from Photos — Removed from everywhere.
Case 2: Photos Uploaded from Google Photos app
When you add photos and videos to Google Photos with Backup and sync turned on, they won’t show up in Google Drive. But if you’re a loyal Google Drive user who wants to see files from Photos in Drive, there’s a feature called Auto-Add for that. Enabling it will create a new folder called Google Photos in Google Drive.
If you accidentally turn on the Auto-Add setting, all images from Google Photos will show up in Drive. Not only photos from the Google Photos tool, but any photos from Google products like Blogger, Google Maps, Google+, etc., associated with your account will appear there.
When you turn the setting off, any photos before that point will continue to appear in Google Drive, but new photos taken after turning the setting off won’t show up.
If you accidentally turn on the Auto-Add setting, all images from Google Photos will show up in Drive.
But what about existing Google Photos files now in Drive? How to delete them while keeping them in Google Photos? Did you directly delete it from the Google Photos folder on Drive? Are not. Doing so will also remove them from Google Photos. Moving the photos to a different folder on Google Drive and then deleting them will have the same result — Google will remove them from both platforms.
Disabling the feature doesn’t help either. If you delete photos from Drive after disabling this feature, the photos will still be deleted from Google Photos according to Google’s notice.
So what’s the solution? Basically, you need to delete the Google Photos folder in Google Drive. As mentioned on Google’s support page, deleting an entire Google Photos folder on Drive does not remove its contents from Photos.
Here are the steps for the same.
1. Turn off the Auto-Add setting
On an Android device, open Google Drive settings and turn off Auto-Add.
On an iOS device, open the Drive app, go to the three-bar menu, tap the Gear-shaped Settings icon, and tap Photos. Then turn off the Google Photos option.
2. Delete the Google Photos folder
Once disabled, force quit the Google Photos and Drive apps. Then open the Drive app and tap the three-dot icon next to the Google Photos folder. Select Remove from the menu. The folder will be immediately deleted from Drive without affecting Google Photos.
For me, the horrible folder was removed from Drive while keeping my photos in Google Photos. Unfortunately, for some users, deleting an album results in the image being removed from Google Photos as well. If that happens to you, restore the folder from the trash in Google Drive.
Be careful what you sync!
Honestly, I recommend keeping your Google Drive and Photos files separate. Since adding images on Photos in high quality offers unlimited backup with the ability to access them on multiple platforms, you won’t miss a thing if you use them separately. You can use the Photos album feature to organize your snapshots. Use Drive for other file types like ZIP files, PDFs, audio files, etc that are not supported in Photos.
What do you think about linking Drive and Photos? Let us know in the comments below.
Next up: Looking for Google Photos alternatives for photo storage? Check out how OneDrive is different from Google Photos.
Categories: How to
Source: thpttranhungdao.edu.vn/en/
