How to delete photos from iCloud
After reading my tutorial on how to archive photos on iCloud, you have activated the iCloud Photo Library to store all your shots on the Apple online space. Do you feel good, but you have not yet figured out how to better manage your shots through this service. In this case, you’re still not clear how to delete photos to free up space on your iCloud Drive account. Well, know that you’ve come to the right place at the right time!
With today’s tutorial, in fact, I’ll show you how to delete photos from iCloud and how to get rid of photos, albums or entire libraries of content that you no longer want to keep in your online store (and consequently in content automatically synchronized on all your devices) . I assure you that this is an extremely simple operation, moreover it can be done from any device: iPhone, iPad, Mac and Windows PC. All you need is five minutes of free time.
What do you say? Are you ready to start? If your answer is affirmative, find the instructions for the device you want to use and proceed by following the instructions below. Unwanted shots that you do not want to keep on your iCloud account will disappear in no time, promised!
How to delete photos from iCloud – Delete individual photos from iCloud
Let’s start this tutorial on how to delete photos from iCloud seeing how to delete individual photos or videos from the famous Apple cloud storage service. There are several ways you can take action: from the Photos app on your iPhone or your iPad, from your PC browser, from the MacOS Photo app, or from the iCloud client for Windows. Choose the path you find most comfortable for your needs and follow it: find all the information you need right here below.
How to delete photos from iCloud – IOS Photo app
Deleting photos from iCloud is simple if you have an iPhone or iPad connected to an Apple ID with the iCloud Photo Library enabled. To check if your iOS device is connected to iCloud and if the iCloud Photo Library is active, open the settings (the gear icon located on the home screen), tap on your name and go to iCloud> Photos . If the active screen next to the iCloud Photo Library option is on the screen that opens, this means that the iCloud Photo Library is active. If in the Settings menu, instead of your name, you find the item Login to iPhone / iPad, tap on the latter and access your Apple ID to connect your device to iCloud (and then, later, activate the iCloud Photo Library via the menu mentioned earlier).
How to delete photos from iCloud
Once you have activated the iCloud Photo Library, you can delete photos and videos from the latter simply by opening the iOS Photo app, selecting the items to remove and tapping the trash can icon located at the bottom right. To select more photos and / or video at the same time, presses the item Select placed at the top right, put the check mark next to the thumbnails of the items to be deleted and proceed by tapping the trash icon located at the bottom right. To confirm deletion of selected images and videos, press the Delete xx photo button that appears at the bottom.
How to delete photos from iCloud
Once deleted from the Photos app, the images and movies in the iOS roll end up in an album, called Deleted recently, where they station for 40 days before their actual cancellation (both from the device and from iCloud). To speed up this process and delete photos and / or videos in an instant, presses on the Album tab of the Photos app, go to Recently Deleted and tap first on Select (top right) and then on Delete all (below) to the left).
If you do not want to delete all the photos and / or videos in the album Recently Deleted but only some of them, tap the Select option (top right), put the check mark next to the thumbnails of the items to be deleted and presses on the Delete item that appears on the bottom left.
If you do not use the iCloud Photo Library but you want to prevent your shots from ending up on Apple’s cloud through the photo streaming function of the Cupertino colossus (which allows you to synchronize photos from the last 30 days on multiple devices without consuming iCloud storage ), went to the Settings menu> [your name]> iCloud> iOS Photos and disable the option to upload to my photo stream
How to delete photos from iCloud – iCloud.com
If you want to delete photos from iCloud using your computer, the simplest solution to which you can contact is the iCloud web panel. By connecting to the iCloud web panel and logging in with your Apple ID, you can access your iCloud Photo Library and manage content directly from your browser, without installing any software on your PC (be it a Windows computer or a Mac) . Comfortable, right?
To access the iCloud web panel, connected to the iCloud.com site using your favorite browser, log in using your Apple ID credentials and click on the Photos icon.
How to delete photos from iCloud
Now, if this is the first time you log in to the service, wait a few minutes for your photo library (and video) to load, then find the contents you want to delete and select their thumbnails using the Ctrl + Click combination Windows or cmd + click on Mac. Pigia then on the icon of the trash can placed at the top right and confirm by replying Delete to the warning that appears on the screen.
How to delete photos from iCloud
Now the photos and / or videos that you trashed have ended up in the Recently Deleted folder of iCloud: this means that they have not been permanently deleted from the servers of the service but are in a “limbo” from which they can be restored within 40 days .
If you want to empty the trash and delete all contents immediately, select the Recently Deleted item from the iCloud web panel sidebar and click on the Delete All item at the top right.
How to delete photos from iCloud
Alternatively, if you do not want to completely empty the iCloud trash but only delete some photos / videos in it, select their thumbnails and click on the Delete xx items item that appears at the top right.
How to delete photos from iCloud – MacOS photo app
If you have a Mac and connected the latter to your iCloud account, you can delete the photos stored on iCloud also through the MacOS Photo app. All you have to do is open the Photos application (the colored flower icon located in the Dock bar), go to the Photo> Preferences menu (top left), select the iCloud tab in the window that opens and, if not, put the check mark next to the iCloud Photo Library entry.
How to delete photos from iCloud
At this point, locate the shots to be deleted from the program library (and therefore also from iCloud Drive), select their thumbnails using the combination cmd + click and proceed with deletion by right clicking on any of them and choosing the option Delete xx photos from the menu that appears.
Alternatively, press the backspace key on your Mac keyboard and confirm that you have deleted all selected contents by replying to Delete on the screen
How to delete photos from iCloud – iCloud for Windows
If you use a Windows PC on which the official iCloud client is installed, you can access your Photo Library and manage it through it. Unfortunately, however, you can not delete the photos you have uploaded to your online space: the only things you can do are download photos from iCloud to your PC and upload photos from your computer to iCloud.
To get access to the iCloud Photo Library through the appropriate Windows client, start the program in question, log in with the credentials of your Apple ID and, when completed, presses the Options button that is next to the Photo entry. In the window that opens, enable the iCloud Photo Library and / or the Photo Stream by putting the check mark next to the appropriate items and save the changes by clicking on the Apply and OK buttons.
Finally, go in the folders Images / iCloud Photos / Downloads and Images / iCloud Photos / Uploads to manage, respectively, the photos downloaded to your PC from iCloud and those loaded from the PC on iCloud and you’re done. You can do everything comfortably from the Windows File Explorer: the iCloud client will take care of “behind the scenes” of data synchronization.
If you need more details on how to use the iCloud client for Windows, see my tutorial on how to download photos from iCloud (in which, among other things, I explained how to manage iCloud photos from Windows PCs).
How to delete photos from iCloud – Delete all photos from iCloud
Do you want to delete all your photo library from iCloud? This can also be done. Get your iPhone or your iPad, access the iOS settings (the gear icon on the home screen) and tap on your name first and then on the iCloud and Manage Space entries.
In the screen that opens, select the item Photos, presses the button Disable and delete, confirm by tap on the item Delete the photos and videos that appears below and you’re done.
From now on you will have 30 days to recover the contents in your personal library on iCloud before they are permanently deleted and rendered unrecoverable. To retrieve data, you can log into iCloud.com from your PC, log in to your account, select Photos and download the contents of interest by selecting their thumbnails and clicking on the cloud icon located at the top right.
How to delete photos from iCloud – Delete Apple ID
If you do not want to delete only the photos from your iCloud account, but all the data stored in the latter, such as contacts, calendar commitments and app documents, contact Apple’s official support: I explained in detail how to do in my tutorial on how to delete Apple ID.
How to delete photos from iCloud