As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words and something very valuable must be kept in a safe place. It might be a good idea to set up your mobile device to back up all your photos and videos to another location.
We all know that cell phones have a significant amount of data storage space these days. If you want to use it, you will find that even too much space is needed to store several thousand photos. But cell phones have everything but security! You may forget it and leave it at work, put it in the wrong place when you buy it, or lose it, or steal it outside the house. Each of these possibilities poses a serious security threat to your privacy. In addition, you may have photos that are unique in their kind and the probability that you will be able to see them again is close to zero. You now better understand the importance of the backup process.
You must say:
“Well, you convinced me. I have a lot of photos that are very important to me. “How can I protect them?”
A great way to protect your photos is to back them up to Google Drive or, more specifically, Google Photos. You can do this via PC as well as Android and iPhone phones.
Backup photos to Google Drive
No matter what type of smartphone you use, you need to pre-download the Google Drive app and install it on your device. For the PC version, you can browse the site through your browser or download the Backup & Sync app.
To download and install the Google Drive app on your device, go to the Google Play Store or Apple App Store.
Here’s how to use Google Drive on each device:
IOS devices (iPhone, iPad and…)
You can use Google Drive as a great way to back up most of your iOS device content. Photos are specifically backed up to Google Photos. This process is very simple, but it is better to pay attention to the following points before starting it:
- Make sure your device is already connected to a Wi-Fi network.
- Note that when you back up your photos multiple times, only newer photos will be saved.
- If your storage capacity is exhausted, your photos will no longer be backed up in Google Photos, and you can prevent this by upgrading your storage capacity in Google Drive.
- Organized photos are transferred to albums, but not the albums themselves!
After downloading and installing the Google Drive app, do the following:
1. Open the Google Drive app on your iOS device and tap the menu (three vertical lines on top of each other) in the upper left corner.
2. From the list that appears, tap Settings.
3. Select Backup.
4. Finally, tap Start Backup to start the backup.
If the backup is not complete and you receive the “Backup did not complete” error message, try again. This may be temporary, but if you run into problems again, make sure your Wi-Fi connection is secure.
Android devices
Just like the iOS process, to get started you need to download the Google Drive app and install it on your device, and then follow these steps:
1- Launch the Google Drive app on your Android device and tap the menu icon (three lines on top of each other) at the top left.
2. Open Settings.
3. Tap Auto Add to add your photos to Google Drive.
View and edit your photos through the Google Drive app or the Google Photos app. If the backup process failed, follow the steps described in the iOS device section.
Computer
One of the easiest ways to back up photos, as well as videos and other data together, is to use Backup & Sync. Of course, the following conditions must be met before loading can begin:
- Your internet connection must be strong. It is best to use an Ethernet connection when transferring data.
- Photos should not be smaller than 256 by 256 pixels and should not be larger than 75 MB. Observe this for all photos.
- Only authorized jpg, png, webp, and some other RAW files are allowed.
Once these requirements are met and you have the Backup & Sync program installed on your computer, follow these steps:
1. Log in to Google Drive, click on the gear icon and select “Get Backup & Sync for your Computer”.
2. Scroll down and select the “Download” option below Backup and Sync.
3- Install the Backup and Sync program and log in using your Google Drive account.
4. Select the folders you want to back up automatically and be sure to check the “Google Photos” box.
5. If you want to sync the contents of your drive to your computer, select the option (Sync My Drive to this computer), when done, tap “Start”.
The work is done and you can easily transfer your photos to Google Drive and Google Photos and relax about their security. If you have any comments about this tutorial, be sure to share it with us through the comments section.
