Turning off/on Photo Sync on iPhone

Question

Turning off/on Photo Sync on iPhone

Hi! I'm trying to free space on my iPhone. I have all my photos and videos on icloud, and I want to keep them there while erasing them from my device. I read that I should turn photo sync off on my phone, and manually delete what I want deleted. Because the sync is off, everything will stay on iCloud.

However, I was wondering what would happen when I turn photo sync back on (on my phone). I know that changes will be updated, meaning anything new will go on my cloud; does that mean that anything I erased (on my phone) would be erased too (on the cloud)? Since iCloud is technically trying to mirror what's on my phone, seems logical to me that it would consider that a change and update it.

Hope it makes sense :) and thanks to all.

iPhone XR, iOS 18

Posted on Jul 16, 2025 02:24 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

CoreCatalyst

Level 1

68 points

Jul 16, 2025 02:29 PM in response to daniquestions

Yep, you’re right! If you turn iCloud Photos back on, your phone will sync with iCloud and anything you deleted from your phone will also get deleted from iCloud. iCloud Photos always keeps everything in sync across devices. If you want to keep photos only in iCloud, you’ll need to use another method, like downloading them to your computer or external devices

Archive or make copies of the information you store in iCloud - Apple Support

Reply

Answer 2

Jul 16, 2025 05:44 PM in response to daniquestions

I second CoreCatalyst's verification of your analysis that re-connecting to iCloud Photos will cause iCloud to delete those pictures so both Libraries will be kept identical.

Have you considered using "Optimize Storage" for Photos on your phone? "Optimize" keeps smaller, screen sized pictures on the phone while the full sized originals are at iCloud. Photos on my phone take up less than 10% of the size of my Photos Library at iCloud.com, and the screen sized images look great. To edit or print a picture, Photos just grabs the full sized version from iCloud as you need it. But as long as you are just viewing the pictures, there is no need for Photos to slow down to access the internet.

Does that sound good?

Reply