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When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.
Someone had issues with Photos over on the iMac board, and of course I suggested making sure the backup was OK. (It was unclear whether iCloud Photos was involved)
But that got me thinking:
When Time machine backs up a library connected to iCloud Photos, does it just back up the thumbnails, or does it download the original?
iMac 24″, macOS 13.2
That would be great, Keith.
I have previously discussed some aspects of iCloud backups, but these user tips have been for previous system versions and need updating.
To put it bluntly- iCloud Photos is not a backup, but making it harder to get a reliable backup, even more so on iOS devices.
I sent this feedback:
As you can see from this discussion:
How does Time Machine Back up a Photos Li… - Apple Community
"There is much confusion when backing up a Photos Library while iCloud Photos is turned on.
Since iCloud Photos is actually a syncing service and not a backup service, it is not sufficient as an archival backup.
When iCloud Photos is turned on, Time Machine should endeavor to download the original images even if "Optimise Storage" is turned on.
Many people have lost images thinking that they are preserved when deleting from a device. Currently Time Machine is not a backstop for this.
While this might take a long time when first getting the originals, it should not be a burden for subsequent backups."
Of course, they thanked me for my interest in Time *Capsule*, so I don't know how much good it will do...
That's right-- just what's on the Mac. But there's more than thumbnails, of course. The editing instructions and all the rest that's in the database is copied. If "Optimize" is turned on, it's possible that the only copies of the originals are in iCloud. But it seems like the originals had to be on the Mac at some point, so they would be in the Time Machine backup somewhere. I'm not at all sure if there is some way to get to them.
But I stopped using "Optimize" on my Mac some time ago. It's great for the phone and iPad, but I'd like to have something I can depend on other than just iCloud.
You cannot even be sure, if all photos have been downloaded from iCloud, if you are not using iCloud Photos. The status bar in Photos is only showing, if the syncing with iCloud is complete, but it does not guarantee, that all originals have been downloaded from iCloud. Photo I have never viewed enlarged on my Mac may never be downloaded from iCloud, even with "optimize Storage2 turned off. Photos 4 on macOS Mojave had a nice option to force the download from iCloud for selected albums, but Apple has removed this option.
Occasionally I am testing if my local copy of the iCloud Photos Library is complete or has missing originals by copying it to an external volume and opening it there. If there are missing originals, I will get a warning about missing originals. Or I try to export a partial library with the recently imported photos using PowerPhotos. PowerPhotos will show a log with all photos that need downloading from iCloud. This test will show at least 20 items or so whenever I test, if my library is complete.
iCloud is a syncing service to keep all the Apple devices together (and pretty cool for that). While it can help restore pictures after certain local catastrophes, it's dangerous, as you point out, to think of iCloud as a backup.
Keith Barkley wrote:
....
So, is iCloud Photos a valid "single point failure" backup solution? I don't think so.
I like iCloud Photos to keep my devices in sync and to have my most important photos stored offsite.
But I am making sure that I am creating backups of all original image files right after taking them. I am keeping this archive of originals on external drives and on iCloud Drive.
iCloud Photos cannot be considered to be a backup because it is not saving a history like Time Machine. There is no way to recover from user errors, without an archival backup. iCloud Photos plus Time Machine could be a perfect combination, if only Photos would not be dragging its feet about downloading all originals from iCloud Photos, when "Optimize Storage" is turned off, or at least would show us what still needs downloading so we could force the download.
Time Machine only backs up what is on the Mac. If photos are optimized, only the lower-res version is backed up. If files are in iCloud only, they are not backed up.
So apparently the best procedure is to have an "archive" library (or several) that has never had iCloud turned on. Then use iCloud for sharing certain pictures among devices.
Man, I knew this was going to be confusing, I am glad I personally have never used iCloud Photos.
So, is iCloud Photos a valid "single point failure" backup solution? I don't think so.
Sounds like this needs a User Tip.
I will go ahead and take a stab.
Won't do much good, but I will send feedback, too
How does Time Machine Back up a Photos Library connected to iCloud Photos?
