Google Photos is ending its Unlimited Free Storage from June 1, 2021

[Sushubh]

Optimized backup was pointless in any case.

 

[Sushubh]

High-quality uploads from your Pixel phone will be exempt.

To build for the future and welcome even more memories, Google Photos is changing its unlimited high-quality storage policy. Starting 1 June, 2021, new photos and videos backed up in high quality will begin to count toward users' 15 GB of Google Account storage, which is shared across Google Drive, Gmail and Google Photos.

Your Pixel device will not be impacted by this change. High-quality uploads from your Pixel device will continue to be free and unlimited. This exemption only applies to uploads made from your Pixel device, not uploads from other devices or via photos.google.com.

Thank you for choosing Google Photos to safely store your life's memories.

If you still have questions or want to learn more about this change, head to our Help Centre.

Your Pixel team

Choose the backup quality of your photos & videos - Android - Google Photos Help

You can automatically save your photos and videos to your Google Account when you turn on backup. Learn how to back up your photos and videos. Each Google Account comes with 15 GB of storage and you

support.google.com

 

[Navjot Singh]

Google confirms future Pixels won't get unlimited Photos storage

One of the selling points for Pixel phones was unlimited original-quality backup to Google Photos, but starting with the Pixel 3a and Pixel 4, there was

www.androidpolice.com

 

[manu1991]

I was actually considering buying a pixel next year because of this

Looks like I need to finally move everything from it

 

[Sachin23]

Do note that its valid only for Pixel 1 - 5. So, if you buy next year's model, your storage will be counted against the quota. Pixel 4A seems to be the only good option for India (hopefully it comes back to stock soon)

 

[manu1991]

Yes that is why I have now dropped the plan. Will buy the iPhone next year.

 

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[manu1991]

Thank f*** for google peering on Excitel

Have ordered a Raspberry Pi 4, will try setting up my own backup solution using Nextcloud or PhotoPrism: Browse your life in pictures

Lets see how it goes

Are there any other alternatives like Google albums where full size photos can be easily shared (even if temporarily) - whatsapp really butchers image quality

 

[Navjot Singh]

Photoprism looks really nice.

 

[Sachin23]

@manu1991 Would you be able to guide me on setting things up? I explored Nextcloud and PhotoPrism. But being a noob that I am, am sure I'll face a set of challenges to set things up. Also, PhotoPrism is still not released. And I understand that it has been under development for a few years now and there's no release date yet. Checked its demo and it seems to serve the problem.

All I am looking for is:
1. A place to store my photos (Original resolution)
2. Ability to search the content of the photos - just like Google Photos. It made life so much easier and the guarantee to find the photo that I was looking for.

I do not mind a paid service. The reason I do not want to pay to Google is that all this while they advertised GP as a free service, had us upload all our photos, trained their algorithms and now since they have fully trained their AI, they want us to pay. Again, paying is not a problem, but if I pay them, I want to ensure that my data is completely MINE. They cannot charge me AND also make use of my data and earn from it too.

Any suggestions would be welcome.

 

[JB701]

You plan to run it at home? If so, you should have some kind of redundancy, preferably also store encrypted backups in cloud. With Docker however, both Nextcloud and Photoprism is very easy to setup.

Also, if you setup at home and you are on ISP NAT, then you can't upload/sync from outside without using ZeroTier/Tailscale. My suggestion would be to get a cheap VPS/Server such as one from online.net and have it backup to a server at home.