The Google Photo app may begin to cause chaos on your iPhone especially if you also use the Apple default photo app since both will basically do the same thing. Imagine a situation where Apple Photos uploads image files to iCloud, and without Google, Photos recognizes that, and starts its own upload to Google drive as well in one iPhone. See now how chaotic that can be? After all, both apps are from two top competitors trying to win you over.
In this article, you’ll learn how to put an end to this seemingly unhealthy competition by unlinking Google Photos from the iPhone.
How to unlink Google Photos from iPhone
There are a couple ways available to quickly get this done. Some users have complained that deleting the Google Photos app still did not solve the issue and I wasn’t expecting it to. So we’ll get that out of the way to explore newer ways to completely unlink Google Photos from the iPhone.
Follow the below guide;
Turn Off Backup In Google Photos
With Backup turned on for Google Photos, it’ll automatically make copies of the images you have on your default photo gallery on iPhone and upload them to Google cloud storage. Fortunately, it’s not a hard thing to do as you can easily put off the function right from the Google Photos app. Follow the steps below to turn backup off for Google Photos;
- Open the Google photos app
- Tap on Menu. You’ll find it at the top left corner of the screen
- Tap on the settings icon
- Toggle the switch to the right of Backup and Sync to off
Disable Read And Write For Google Photos
Preventing Google Photos app from accessing your storage is also a good way to Unlink your iPhone from the Google Photos app. Disabling Reading and Writing simply means that the system has been set to prevent all inputs from the app.
Hence, no data from the rest of the iPhone is shared in common with Google Photos app and prevents it from copying and uploading to Google cloud storage images you have on your Photo gallery.
To turn off Read and Write for Google Photos, follow the below guide;
- Open iPhone Settings
- Scroll down and select Google Photos from the app section
- Scroll to the ‘Allow Google to Access’ section
- You’ll find that the Photos icon will be currently set to Read and Write
- Tap on it to show the drop down menu and select Never
Disable Read And Write For Google Drive
Just like was done with the Google Photos app in the iPhone settings, you also have to apply the same to the Google Drive app. Turning off Read and Write for Google Drive kind of seals off the unlinking and prevents either the Google Photos app or Google Drive from sharing the same gallery image files.
Follow the below guide to disable Read and Write in settings for Google Drive;
- Open iPhone Settings
- From the app section, select the Google Drive icon
- Scroll to the ‘Allow Google to Access’ section
- Tap on it and select ‘Never’ from the drop down menu
With these settings completed, you’ll find that automatic uploads to cloud storage will cease as well as the sync with Apple Photos that is responsible for effecting changes you make on the Google Photos app on Apple Photos.
Must Read
How To Turn Off Volume Limit On iPhone
How To Turn Off X-Ray Mode On iPhone
How To Cancel An Update On iPhone
Can I Unsync Google Photos From iPhone?
Yes, you can easily have your Google Photos unsynced on your iPhone. Usually people expect it to be a daunting task given how much of a headache that can be caused by the sync.
A lot of users have complained that because Google Photos is synced with their iPhone, almost every photo found in the Apple Photos gallery has a duplicate on Google Photos. In addition to that, changes like deleting a photo from Google Photos also deletes that same image on the iPhone default photo gallery.
This is the trouble that many users have been faced with and looking for a way to quit the sync with Google Photos on their iPhone. This issue can easily be solved by doing a combination if the following;
- Disabling Backup on Google Photos
- Setting Read and Write to Never for the Google Photos app and Google Drive.
Your iPhone will stop the sync with Google Photos once this setting is completed.
Why Should I Unsync Google Photos From iPhone?
You may want to unsync your iPhone with the Google Photos app for two reasons;
Get Ready To Pay For More Internet Plan
Especially if you’re on cellular, your internet usage count may increase significantly without your knowledge. The worst part is that the internet spend will be used on something that doesn’t benefit you much.
Here’s why, Google Photos will make a duplicate for every of your images and upload the same to Google cloud storage. Depending on the number and average file size of the images you have, you may spend double than normal on mobile data.
Remember also that the same upload to cloud happens also with Apple Photos, in this case to iCloud. These two processes running at the same time on your iPhone due to the sync will heavily impact on your cellular data consumption.
Google Drive Storage Will Run Out
The sync with Google Photos on your iPhone may cause you to run off available storage space on Google Drive. No doubt, Google cloud solutions have benefited everyone. Google assigns to everyone who signed up with them a minimum storage space of about 15Gb. Apart from having enough space to upload files like images to Google Drive, this space also caters for emails you receive and other minor activities.
Having duplicate images cluttering up this space on your Google drive can be very hurtful especially given the fact that images usually will have large file sizes. In the long run you may find that sending and receiving Emails will not be possible as storage has been used up. You may finally resort to paying for more cloud storage which is not cheap.
Conclusion
Since Apple Photos is default for your iPhone, and also uploads to iCloud to keep your photos safe, I’ll advise you to have only Apple Photos do all of the work. Allowing Google Photos to take on the job too can be catastrophic as has been detailed in this article. If you’re already caught in the web, use the guide in this article on how to unlink Google Photos from the iPhone to fix the issue.
Leave a Reply