Deleting photos on Mac without deleting photos in iCloud
How do I delete all photos from Photo app on my computer (to free up memory), without deleting the photos in iCloud too?
MacBook Air
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This is not possible, if you have been using iCloud Photos Library. iCloud Photos Library is primarily a syncing service. We use it to keep the photo libraries on all synced devices identical to to the central photos library in iCloud. as a consequence, when you delete a photo from your Photos library on any device, it will be deleted from iCloud and all other synced devices as well.
To save storage on your Mac with iCloud Photos turn on "Optimize Mac Storage", but do not delete any photos, that you want to keep. The "Optimize Mac Storage" option for iCloud will remove the high resolution originals from your mac and keep them only in iCloud, if you need to free storage. Optimizing is fully automatic. You cannot control, which photos will be removed locally. Usually iCloud will optimize the photosyou have not used in a long time and keep the recent downloads.