I see I have iCloud Drive enabled, I have photos enabled. I need to clear up space on my desktop and iPhone. Can I safely delete photos from these two devices without loosing the photos? Are they copied already on iCloud?
R
iCloud Drive and iCloud Photos are two separate options. Both are syncing services.
iCloud Photos is a syncing service. Any photo you delete from a device where iCloud Photos is turned on will also be deleted from iCloud and from any other device connected to iCloud Photos. You can potentially reduce the storage space required on a device by turning on Optimize Storage. See the following Apple article for more information: Set up and use iCloud Photos - Apple Support
Apple does not currently offer cloud-only storage for photos. If that is what you want or need, you may want to explore 3rd party options such as Google Photos or Dropbox.
Another way that photos may be on iCloud (if you don’t have iCloud Photos turned on) is via a backup of an iOS device. The only thing you can do with a backup is use it to restore a device or set up a new device. The contents of backups are not viewable at iCloud.com and if you delete a photo from a device it will not be included in future backups and will be lost.
You can archive photos / documents from Mac initially Archive or make copies of the information you store in iCloud - Apple Support
Then delete desired photos / documents , the photos will be deleted from photo app and moved to recently deleted and kep only for 30 days Delete photos from iCloud in Photos on Mac - Apple Support for files see Recover deleted files on iCloud.com - Apple Support but you have already archived them , when they are eased still you have not lost them , they can be recovered from archive locations .
I Cloud drive photos question
