The difference between iCloud back up and sync
What is the difference in between iCloud Photos sync and iCloud Photo backup?
Does iCloud do back up for unsync photos?
Question marked as
You can back up your iOS device to iCloud. What does iCloud back up? - Apple Support tells us that many different types of data are included in the backup:
Here’s what iCloud Backup includes
- App data
- Apple Watch backups
- Device settings
- Home screen and app organization
- iMessage, text (SMS), and MMS messages
- Photos and videos on your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch
- Purchase history from Apple services, like your music, movies, TV shows, apps, and books3
- Ringtones
- Visual Voicemail password (requires the SIM card that was in use during backup)
So in this process your photos are included in the backup of your iOS device to iCloud.
This does not apply though if you have iCloud Photos active. Set up and use iCloud Photos - Apple Support
shows you how iCloud Photos works. It is one of the many iCloud services which acts as a hub or unifier for your stored content. A brief passage from the linked page explains: iCloud Photos automatically keeps every photo and video you take in iCloud, so you can access your library from any device, anytime you want. Any changes you make to your collection on one device change on your other devices too.
Every device you have using iCloud Photos will have the same content because it is synchronised via iCloud, and because it is synchronised via iCloud Photos your photos do not not need to be included in your iOS backups to iCloud.