How do I upload photos to the cloud from my macbook without them also being added to my phone's camera roll?
How do I upload photos to the cloud from my macbook without them also being added to my phone's camera roll?
MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 11.6
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How do I upload photos to the cloud from my macbook without them also being added to my phone's camera roll?
You can't. iCloud isn't a place you upload pictures to; it's a syncing service that makes all your devices (that you've chosen) have exactly the same pictures. And if, for instance, you delete a picture on your phone, it get's deleted everywhere.
If you are concerned about storage, you can, on your iPhone, go to Settings>Photos and choose "Optimize iPhone Storage," and that will keep only smaller, screen sized images on your phone while the full pictures remain at iCloud.com.
Another option is to maintain some pictures on your Mac in an alternate library that is not connected to iCloud. You can have many Photos Libraries, but only one is your System Library and connected to iCloud.
You should keep backups of all your libraries on a separate drive. iCloud doesn't really backup your pictures-- it synchronizes them.