Local, cloud, or something in between?
Thanks to years of innovation in smartphone camera technology, we’ve all become amateur photographers in our spare time. Long gone are the days of scrapbooks and developing film — instead, we always have our entire collection of images right in our pocket at all times. You’re likely taking more photos than ever before too, which makes your library all the more important to protect. Thankfully, there’s an abundance of ways to keep your photos backed up and safe, and as an Android user, you’re probably already using one or more.
As we wrap up Mobile Photography Week here at Android Police, I think it’s good to consider all the ways to keep your photos safe. As you head out into the world with an improved set of skills, knowing your image library is backed up and not locked to a single device is essential. Thankfully, Google Photos is included by default on most Android phones these days, meaning you won’t even need to dive into the Play Store to find a solution.
That said, alternatives do exist, and not just to Google Photos. While services like Amazon Photos often come with free storage through a subscription you’re likely already paying for, you can also avoid paying fees altogether through the use of a Synology NAS. Synology’s photos app is surprisingly great, and moving your collection from Google Photos is easier than you’d think. You can also make local copies on external hard drives, though obviously, a mixture of local and cloud backups is your best case scenario.
So, I’m curious. How does the AP readership keep their photos backed up in 2023? Google Photos seems like the obvious bet — even if it hasn’t been truly free storage for the last couple of years — but there are plenty of other options, too. Local storage, competing cloud services, and even custom servers are all ways to maintain your library without fear of losing your data.
