You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!
When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.
When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.
Does anyone know how to download or copy photos from iCloud to a PC hard drive? Apple support was no help at all. I installed "icloud for windows" and followed directions in online articles and it didn't work. I've also tried different browsers with no luck. There's got to be a way but I've run out of ideas. I'm computer literate but by no means a geek.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
Windows, Windows 6
If you use an internet browser on your PC and log into iCloud.com and go to the Photos app there, do you see the Photos?
If not, that indicates that you don't have photos synced to iCloud Photos. You may have photos as part of an iCloud Backup of an iOS device, but you can only use such a backup to restore or setup an iOS device. You can't otherwise access them.
If the photos are visible via a browser at icloud.com, the instructions in Set up and use iCloud Photos on your Windows PC - Apple Support
including the section "Download your photos and videos from iCloud Photos" should work. Another method is to simply use the internet browser and select and download the photos from the Photos app at iCloud.com.
If you use an internet browser on your PC and log into iCloud.com and go to the Photos app there, do you see the Photos?
If not, that indicates that you don't have photos synced to iCloud Photos. You may have photos as part of an iCloud Backup of an iOS device, but you can only use such a backup to restore or setup an iOS device. You can't otherwise access them.
If the photos are visible via a browser at icloud.com, the instructions in Set up and use iCloud Photos on your Windows PC - Apple Support
including the section "Download your photos and videos from iCloud Photos" should work. Another method is to simply use the internet browser and select and download the photos from the Photos app at iCloud.com.
re: If you have any other ideas, I'm all ears.
See: Set up and use iCloud Photos on your Windows PC - Apple Support
Install iCloud for Windows and use it instead of a browser; shouldn't be necessary to do that for what you want but it is another option.
I've been perplexed by this too, so hopefully my experience may help you. Referring to the Web browser approach to iCloud, once you've logged in, you should see a welcome message, along with your name, below it "Account Settings>" and below that a set of icons : Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Photos, etc.
Clicking on the Photos icon takes you to the iCloud Photos screen... which displays a list of your photos.
Sadly from here, this is where the User interface design is confusing.
The default display mode is "Moments", where the photos are displayed as thumbnails sorted by date, and location vertically.
In this mode, in order to download Photos, you need to select them first (there's no download all function..., and no simple select All function AFAIK).
When you hover the mouse over a photo, you should see to the right a blue "Select" appear...
Selecting one or two photo's using this "Select" function is okay, but if you want to select a large number, then it's cumbersome (see later).
* To Download
Once you have some photos selected , the "Cloud" icon at the top of the web browser (with the downward pointing arrow) should now be available (i.e. not a really light grey color). Clicking this will produce a zip file containing the selected photo's which will then be downloaded to your default "Downloads" folder on your PC.
... Now a I mentioned above, this approach is not very helpful when it comes to downloading a lot of Photos...
From the top of the browser display, select "Photos" rather than Moments, The display now changes to displaying your photos as thumbnails (smaller sized pictures of your actual photos) and by Month/Year.
In this mode, you have a Shift-Select operation whereby you can select a continuous sequence of photos, by clicking upon the First photo in that sequence, and whilst holding down the Shift key, click upon the last one - all should now be highlighted.
With all highlighted you can follow the same download instructions as above.
Hope that helps.
Thank you so much for the detailed response! That's what I need. Unfortunately, I'm still getting the "Failed - Network error" message after trying to download photos. It looks like a zip folder is created but after a long time of seemingly downloading the photos, it ends in the network error message.
I checked that javascript is enabled and it is.
I know I can't download more than 1,000 photos at a time so I tried 2 and then 200. Same problem with both.
I will say that when I hover my mouse over a photo I don't get the blue "Select" you mentioned. Instead I get an outline of a heart on the lower left of the photo, which I think designates the photo as a "favorite" if you click on it. I don't think that's what you're referring to though.
It must be something I'm doing wrong or my computer doesn't have the right something-or-other. I'm mystified.
I do get all the photos when I click on Photos option. I select the ones I want to download, then click on the download button at the top. It looks like a zip file is created and it's trying to download, but after a long time I get the following message: "Failed - Network error". I'm at a dead end and feel like I've tried everything I could possibly try. I called Apple Support and the guy I spoke with seemed to have no clue how to download photos from iCloud to PC. Very frustrating. Thanks for trying! If you have any other ideas, I'm all ears.
I haven't personally tried it but according to System requirements for iCloud - Apple Support
it does. See the following from that document:
iCloud for Windows 7 or iCloud for Windows 10*
I did that but I'm wondering if it works for Windows 7. Do you know?
Does anyone know how to download or copy photos from iCloud to a PC hard drive?
