Google is upgrading its Takeout tool for Photos to add support for incremental exports. So, after an initial export of your entire library, you can schedule future exports to only include new photos and videos added since the last export.
As someone with a photo library nearing 1.8TB who also keeps local backups, this is a welcome addition. It means I no longer have to download my entire library every time I want to back up newly added photos and videos to my NAS or Immich library.
Schedule future incremental Google Photos exports
Even better, you can schedule future exports to happen automatically every two months for up to a year. That means six exports every second month containing only new photos and videos added since the last takeout. That’s the maximum supported frequency for now, so after a year, you’ll have to re-run the Takeout process.
Other options remain the same, so you can still generate ZIP files up to 50GB in size. Likewise, you can either receive a download link via email or directly add the files to Drive, Dropbox, or Box.
As Google mentions in its announcement on its support forums, the first scheduled export will contain all your selected photos and albums. Only future exports will be incremental, containing new uploaded or edited items.
Do note that the new scheduled export option will only appear in Google Takeout when you select Google Photos during the export process.
