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Free up space by removing photos??

Is the a way not to store photos on my MacBook Air at all? I have them set to store in iCloud, but it's still taking up almost 50 G and I only have 120 to work with. I'm constantly out of space and that's the only thing I see that I could change.

Posted on Oct 26, 2020 7:35 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Oct 26, 2020 9:16 AM

Which year MacBook Air do you have? Which macOS are you running? Can you also uncheck SHARED ALBUMS?

Also, Click on the Apple icon at the top left of your Menu Bar (Top) ➔ About this Mac ➔ Storage (Allow a few seconds for information to populate) ➔ Manage: Here, see how much space photos is taking up as storage space on your Mac (Left Column).


Axel F.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 26, 2020 9:16 AM in response to maecvilla

Which year MacBook Air do you have? Which macOS are you running? Can you also uncheck SHARED ALBUMS?

Also, Click on the Apple icon at the top left of your Menu Bar (Top) ➔ About this Mac ➔ Storage (Allow a few seconds for information to populate) ➔ Manage: Here, see how much space photos is taking up as storage space on your Mac (Left Column).


Axel F.

Oct 26, 2020 8:16 AM in response to maecvilla

As you have learned, iCloud is a synch service and not a data archiving service where. The purpose of iCloud is to synch data across all your devices. Having said that, you can free up some space on your MacBook Air by choosing optimize photos.

Open Photos app ➔ Preferences ➔ iCloud tab ➔ Put a checkmark in OPTIMIZE PHOTOS.

This should free up most of the 50GB storage space that photos is taking up on your MacBook AIr. Once you activate this function then high and original resolution photos will be stored on iCloud and low resolution photo representatives will be stored on your MacBook Air. This will generate space on the MacBook Air. When you display a photo on your MacBook Air the the high resolution equivalent will be downloaded from iCloud and displayed on the screen.


Axel F.

Free up space by removing photos??

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