Android and iOS both have smart photo services built in nowadays, but what happens when you want to jump from one to the other Heres what you need to know.

Advertisement In this guide well be tackling the challenge of moving your whole photo library from one service to the other: this is a full traded-in-my-iPhone-for-a- Pixel scenario, a clean break where youre switching from Apple Photos to Google Photos or back the other way.

Image: Google Advertisement For a lot of people it might be better to have a foot in both camps, at least for some photos or for some of the time, but for simplicitys sake we wont go into every possible scenario here.

You can in fact use these services alongside each other pretty easily, but in this case well tackle going from one to the other wholesale.

Its also worth noting these are not exactly directly comparable services, with Apples photo offerings very much baked into its hardware and software, and Google Photos very much web-first and operating independently of your computers, phones and tablets.

GO Media may get a commission Averie Leopard Cardigan Buy for 89 from Anthropologie Switching from Apple Photos to Google Photos Before you jump to Google Photos you need to decide if you want to store your photos (and videos) at their original resolution or whether youre happy to put up with some resizing images are stored at a maximum of 16 megapixels and videos are stored at a maximum of 1080p HD.

Advertisement If you choose the second option, you can store as much as you want, for free.

If you want to keep everything as it is, you need to think about paying for Google Drive storage, as you only get 15GB for free.

Prices start at 100GB for 1.99 a month.

Advertisement Once youve decided, you need to work out where your photos are, and given the different apps on macOS and iOS, and the recent upgrades to both, you could be forgiven for not being too sure.

Google Photos Download The Google

Download the Google Photos desktop client for macOS and mobile app for iOS and both will get to work picking up all the pictures from your computers and iDevices.

The desktop app asks which photo libraries you want to back up when you start it, and the iOS app simply backs up everything it can find.

Advertisement The only images and videos that might get missed are those youve uploaded to iCloud and deleted from your devices, if youre using iCloud.

On iOS, if you have the space, open Settings then tap iCloud, Photos and Download and Keep Originals.

Advertisement If for whatever reason you cant get your iCloud photos back to a Mac or iOS device, the export options from iCloud on the web are a little less than stellar.

Pictures can be downloaded individually easily enough, but for bulk downloads you have to use the Shift or Cmd keys to select multiple items at once, then click the download icon.

Once saved somewhere, they can be uploaded to Google Photos using a desktop client or just your web browser.

Switching from Google Photos to Apple Photos As weve said, Google Photos lives on the web, but getting all your pictures and videos back down again isnt too difficultthough it might take some time if youve got a massive photo library and a sluggish internet connection.

With Apple Photos, you dont have to store your pictures in the cloud, but if you do then youll probably need to pay for extra storage.

Advertisement The Google Photos desktop client for macOS doesnt have two-way sync, but the one for Google Drive does.

First, go to Google Drive on the web, open the Settings page (via the cog icon) and tick the box marked Automatically put your Google Photos into a folder in My Drive under the General tab.

Advertisement That doesnt change anything about whats stored in Google Photos, it just makes everything visible in Google Drive.

Google Photos Install The MacOS

Then, download and install the macOS client for Google Drive, and make sure the Google Photos folder is selected in the list of folders to sync, which will be displayed during the setup process.

Hey presto, all your photos and videos are pulled down from the cloud.

Google Photos Download Mac