Google Photos for Beginners: Back Up Your Photos
How many photographs are on your phone right now?
500?
5,000?
20,000?
For many of us, our phone has quietly become the family photo album.
Birthdays, holidays, pets, children growing up, screenshots, Christmas mornings and hundreds of photographs of things we can't even remember taking.
Which raises an important question:
What happens to all those photographs if your phone is lost, stolen or simply stops working?
That's where Google Photos can help.
What Is Google Photos?
Google Photos is Google's service for storing, organising, searching, viewing and sharing photographs and videos.
One of its most useful features is Backup.
When Backup is enabled, Google Photos can automatically save supported photographs and videos from your device to your Google Account.
You can then access backed-up photographs from other devices where you're signed into the same Google Account.
That means your phone doesn't necessarily have to be the only place your photographs exist.
Google Photos Isn't the Same as the Gallery on Your Phone
This is worth understanding.
Your phone may have its own Gallery or Photos application showing photographs stored locally on the device.
Google Photos can display both local and cloud-backed-up photographs.
This can occasionally make things confusing.
Seeing a photograph inside the Google Photos app doesn't automatically tell you everything about where that photograph is stored.
The important question is:
Has it actually been backed up?
How to Check Whether Backup Is Enabled
Open the Google Photos app.
Tap your Google Account profile picture or initial at the top.
Google Photos displays the current backup status.
You may see something such as:
Backup complete
If you want to check the settings themselves, go into:
Photos settings → Backup
Make sure Backup is enabled and — very importantly — check which Google Account is being used.
It's surprisingly easy to have several Google Accounts on a phone.
You don't want to spend two years thinking your photographs are being saved to one account when they're actually going somewhere else.
Check an Individual Photograph
You can also check whether a particular photograph has been backed up.
Open the photograph and look at its details or backup status.
This is worth doing when you're first configuring Google Photos.
Take a photograph.
Wait for the backup to complete.
Then confirm that Google Photos says it has been backed up.
Don't simply assume everything is working.
Verify it.
Test It From Another Device
Here's an even better test.
After Google Photos says Backup is complete, open a web browser on another device and sign into Google Photos using the same Google Account.
Can you see the photograph?
Excellent.
You've now confirmed that the photograph isn't only sitting on your phone.
This is a much better test than simply hoping the backup icon means what you think it means.
What Gets Backed Up?
Google Photos can automatically back up photographs and videos from supported devices.
On Android, you can also choose which device folders should be included.
For example, you might have folders containing:
Camera photographs
Screenshots
WhatsApp images
downloaded pictures
images from other applications
You may not necessarily want every image from every application uploaded to Google Photos.
Check your backup settings and choose what's appropriate for you.
Wi-Fi or Mobile Data?
Uploading thousands of photographs and videos can transfer a considerable amount of data.
Google Photos provides settings controlling whether backup can use mobile data.
If you have limited mobile data, check these settings carefully.
You may prefer large backups to happen while you're connected to Wi-Fi.
Original Quality vs Storage Saver
Google Photos currently offers different backup quality options.
Two you'll commonly encounter are:
Original quality
and:
Storage saver
Original Quality
Google says photographs and videos stored using Original quality retain the resolution in which they were captured.
These files count towards your Google Account storage.
This is a good choice if retaining the original quality is particularly important to you.
Storage Saver
Storage Saver can reduce the size of photographs and videos to save storage space.
It still counts towards your Google Account storage for current uploads, but it can allow you to fit considerably more into the same storage allowance.
Which option is right for you depends on what's more important:
Maximum original quality
or:
Using less storage
How Much Google Photos Storage Do I Get?
A standard personal Google Account currently includes up to 15 GB of storage.
But remember something we covered in our Google Drive guide:
That storage isn't exclusively for Google Photos.
It's shared across services including:
Google Photos
Google Drive
and:
Gmail
So if Gmail contains lots of large attachments and Drive contains large files, there may be less space available for photographs.
Likewise, thousands of photographs and videos can reduce the storage available to Gmail and Drive.
Videos Can Use a Lot of Space
Modern phones can record very high-quality video.
That's wonderful.
It's also capable of consuming cloud storage remarkably quickly.
If Google tells you your storage is filling up, large videos are one of the things worth investigating.
Google provides storage-management tools that can help identify items consuming significant amounts of space.
Google Photos Search Is Brilliant
This is one of my favourite parts of Google Photos.
Once you have years of photographs, manually scrolling backwards becomes painful.
Use Search.
Depending on the contents of your library and the features available on your account, Google Photos can help you find photographs based on things such as:
people
places
and:
things
Instead of remembering:
“I think we went there in August 2022...”
you can search for something associated with the photograph.
This can make a library containing tens of thousands of photographs surprisingly manageable.
Create Albums
Albums are useful for grouping related photographs.
You might create:
Cornwall Holiday 2026
Christmas 2026
Family
Dog
Wedding
RNLI Events
Favourite Photographs
A photograph can appear in an album without you needing to create another copy of the actual photograph.
Albums are primarily a way of organising and presenting groups of photographs.
Favourites
See a photograph you particularly like?
Mark it as a favourite.
You can then quickly return to your favourite photographs rather than searching through everything.
This is particularly useful when you have thousands of images but perhaps only a few hundred you genuinely love.
Sharing Photographs
Google Photos makes it easy to share photographs and albums with other people.
But apply the same rule we discussed with Google Drive:
Think before you share.
Ask yourself:
Who am I sharing this with?
What photographs are included?
Does the album contain anything private?
Am I happy for these people to see everything included?
It's easy to select a collection of photographs without noticing something personal among them.
Check before sending.
Be Careful When Deleting Photos
This is probably the most important section in this entire article.
Deleting something from Google Photos isn't necessarily the same as simply removing a local copy from your phone.
Google's current guidance says that deleting backed-up photographs or videos from Google Photos can also remove them from devices where Google Photos is installed and Backup is enabled.
So don't start deleting thousands of photographs thinking:
“They're in the cloud, so this must only remove them from my phone.”
That's not how you should approach it.
Understand which delete option you're using before pressing it.
What Happens to Deleted Photos?
Google Photos currently keeps deleted photographs and videos in its Bin for 30 days before permanently deleting them.
That gives you an opportunity to recover something you've deleted accidentally.
But once an item has been permanently deleted, Google says it can't be restored through Google Photos.
So the Bin is a safety net.
It isn't a permanent archive.
Want to Free Space on Your Phone Instead?
Google Photos has a feature called:
Free up space on this device
This is different from simply selecting photographs and pressing Delete.
Once Google Photos has confirmed eligible photographs and videos are safely backed up, the Free up space feature can remove local device copies.
The backed-up copies remain available through Google Photos.
This can be extremely useful when your phone is running out of storage.
But I strongly recommend checking that your backup is complete before using it.
Remember our rule:
Don't assume. Verify.
What Happens After Freeing Up Space?
Suppose Google Photos has backed up 5,000 photographs.
You then use Free up space on this device.
Google Photos may remove eligible local copies from the phone.
You'll still be able to see the backed-up photographs in Google Photos while signed into your account.
But they're no longer necessarily physically stored on the phone itself.
That means if you're offline, some photographs may not be available in exactly the same way as locally stored files.
Google Photos Is Useful — But Have Another Backup for Irreplaceable Photos
Google Photos is an excellent way of protecting photographs from something simple such as a lost or broken phone.
But for truly irreplaceable family photographs, I wouldn't rely on one service as the only copy forever.
Consider keeping another independent copy of your most important photographs.
For example:
Google Photos
plus:
an external drive or another properly managed backup
Why?
Because mistakes happen.
Accounts can have problems.
Files can accidentally be deleted.
Nothing replaces having another independent copy of something that can never be recreated.
Your child's first birthday photographs are rather more important than your ability to recover a random screenshot from last Tuesday.
Don't Forget Your Google Account Security
If Google Photos contains years of your personal photographs, your Google Account becomes extremely valuable.
Protect it.
Use:
A strong, unique password
and:
2-Step Verification
Also make sure your recovery information is current.
Your photo collection isn't something you want to lose access to because you can't recover your Google Account.
What If I Change Phones?
This is one of the big advantages of cloud-backed-up photographs.
If your old phone's photographs have been properly backed up to Google Photos, you can sign into the same Google Account on your new device and access your Google Photos library.
You don't necessarily have to manually copy thousands of photographs from one phone to another.
Again, though:
Check that Backup is complete before wiping, selling or trading in the old phone.
That's worth repeating.
Never wipe an old phone until you've verified your important data exists somewhere else.
A Good “New Phone” Checklist
Before getting rid of your old phone:
✓ Open Google Photos.
✓ Check the correct Google Account.
✓ Confirm Backup is complete.
✓ Check important recent photographs individually.
✓ Sign into Google Photos from another device.
✓ Confirm those photographs appear.
✓ Check other important data separately.
Only once you're satisfied everything important exists elsewhere should you consider wiping the old device.
Google Photos Beginner's Checklist
If you're new to Google Photos:
✓ Turn on Backup if you want cloud backup.
✓ Check which Google Account is being used.
✓ Verify that Backup actually completes.
✓ Check important photographs from another device.
✓ Decide between Original quality and Storage Saver.
✓ Understand that Photos shares your Google storage allowance.
✓ Learn to use Search.
✓ Create albums for important collections.
✓ Be careful when sharing photographs.
✓ Understand Delete before using it.
✓ Use Free up space carefully.
✓ Keep another copy of truly irreplaceable photographs.
✓ Protect your Google Account with 2-Step Verification.
The Most Important Lesson
Google Photos can make looking after thousands of photographs remarkably easy.
But don't fall into the trap of thinking:
“Google Photos is installed, therefore everything must be backed up.”
Installation isn't enough.
Check the backup status.
Check the account.
Verify important photographs exist online.
And understand what Delete does before using it.
Five minutes checking these things today could prevent an extremely upsetting discovery when a phone eventually breaks.
Where Do We Go Next?
So far in our Google beginner series we've covered:
and now:
Google Photos
Next we're going to look at another Google service that can replace the paper calendar stuck to the kitchen wall:
Google Calendar for Complete Beginners
We'll learn how to create appointments, set reminders, make recurring events, use multiple calendars and share calendars with other people.
We'll also look at how Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Maps can work together.
Tech Ramblings 50
Practical Google and technology guides for everyday users — explained without assuming you're already an IT expert.
Google Beginner Series: Previous: Google Drive for Beginners: Store and Share Files | Next: Google Calendar for Beginners: Never Miss a Date
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