Most users on their phones use the usual gallery to work with photos, they are not even aware of the existence of a rather powerful tool for working with photos from Google. If you use Google Photos, you always have a backup copy of your photos in the cloud, you can give access to photos to the people you need, create collages and animations, make photos stylized and much more.

In today’s article, we’ll take a closer look at the Google Photos app. This application works on Android, iOS, and you can also access it via the Internet on any device. Very often I came across users who lost their phone and with it all their photos, as well as those who had a hard drive on their computer, and on it there was a whole life in photos that can no longer be restored. Google Photos provides free and unlimited storage for your photos! And most importantly, your photos will be safe, and the threat of losing them will be minimized.

Installing Google Photos

You can install the Google Photos application on Android devices via Google Play, and to use it you must have a Google account (if you do not have one, you can follow the link and create one). On other devices, Google Photos can be found through a search. In today’s article, we will consider working with the Google Photos app on Android, but this guide is suitable for all devices.

When you start the application for the first time, there will be ads with the capabilities of this application, and to get started, you need to click “Start”

The next step is to enable or disable “Startup and sync”. If you leave everything by default in this window, then all new photos will be uploaded to the cloud when the device is connected to Wi-Fi. Also, any changes in the photos will be synchronized with the cloud. Only you will have access to the photos, and in this way you will have a backup copy of all your photos on the Internet, available at any time and from any device.

If you click “Change settings” you can choose in what quality to upload photos and videos to the cloud:high quality (default) – photos and videos are saved in high quality, but the file size is reduced (you can store an unlimited number of files); original size – photos and videos are saved in their original size, but for such files, the storage size is limited to 15GB. Also in this window, you can allow the use of mobile Internet for synchronization with the cloud. After making changes, click “Save” and “Finish”

The next window will show some of the capabilities of Google Photos, after reviewing, click on the checkmark in the lower right.

Places and objects

Google Photos will automatically organize your uploaded photos by location and date they were taken. Click on the search button at the bottom right of the screen.

This application uses various image processing techniques to group them together. You can see auto-grouped photos in this menu, the categories will depend on what you photographed and where. For example, photos can be divided into groups with the names of cities (in which they were taken), maybe a group with the name Christmas (if the photos were taken at Christmas), also “Forest” for example (if you took a photo in the forest), selfies and much other.

Make animations or collage 

After installing the Google Photos application, after a while you may receive a message that a new animation has been created and you can watch it by clicking on the notification. That is, the application itself takes some photos and forms a collage or animation from it. But you don’t have to wait for Google to do this, you can click on the plus in the upper right in the main menu and select the creation of the desired one from the list.

Having selected a collage or animation in the next window, you will be prompted to select the photos that will be used to create it. Check the boxes you need and click “Create”

In the next window, you will see the result, which you can share via social networks, Bluetooth, mail, etc.

Photo editing

You can open any photo, click on the pencil and the editor menu will open in front of you. You will see many functions for working with a photo, from automatically improving its quality, then manually changing the brightness, manually adjusting the color, dimming in a circle, cropping, rotating the photo, etc.

After making changes, click “Save” and a new photo will appear in your library, that is, the original will not be replaced! A new photo will be created and your changes will be applied to it.

Google Photos offline

If your device does not have the Internet, you can still create albums, collages, animations, edit photos, in other words, use all the functions. It’s just that the changes will not be synced to the cloud storage until you are connected to the Internet. That is, you can work with the application without the Internet for a month, and as soon as you are connected to it – all your changes are immediately synchronized with the cloud.

Sharing an album, or sharing photos with whoever you want

By opening any photo in the Google Photos app, you can share it with any user, regardless of whether they are using the same app or not. Open the photo and at the bottom left click on “Share”

A menu will open in front of you, in which you can choose how to share this photo. If you choose mail, this photo will be attached to the letter, and you will only have to choose the addressee. Also with other functions: Viber, mms, bluetooth, Google +, etc.

At the very top, you can create a link to this photo, if you click on “Create link” – a link will be created and copied to the clipboard, and you can already send it to any user.

You can add a photo to a shared album from the share menu, give a link to it to various users and, if you want, give access to add a photo to this album. From the main menu, you can also create a new shared album, and give access to it through a link to any user. Click on the + at the top right and select “Shared Album”

A window with a choice of photos for general access will open in front of you, you can select one day or several at once. After selection, click “Next”

In the next window, you can come up with any name for the shared album, if you want to change the name in the future – it’s easy to do, go to the shared album and click on the + at the top. A permalink will be assigned to the album and can be sent to different users so that they can access it.

Shared albums can be found by clicking on “Albums” at the bottom right of the screen, or by clicking on the three lines in the upper right and selecting “Shared Albums”

If you click on the three dots near the album, you can copy the link to it, or remove access to other users to this album (by clicking on the remove link)

If you open a shared album and click on the + at the top, you can add or remove a photo from it, add a description for each photo, mark this photo on the map

Also, having opened a shared album, you will have a share button, and by going to three points in the upper right you can: edit the album, add the album name, delete it or configure access

In the “Access settings” you can: copy the link to the album, or remove it (thereby removing the access); allow or disallow other users to add photos to the album; and also see who joined the album using your link.

Hide where the photos were taken

Let’s go to the “Settings” menu, that is, click on the three lines at the top left and select “Settings”

Here you can enable or disable the “Hide locations” function, enable it if you want other users who have access to your photos not to see where they were taken.

Also, if you select “Location Settings” you can turn off tracking of your location, which in turn will slightly change the ordering of the photos. That is, if tracking of your location is allowed – information about the shooting location helps to automatically organize photos and makes them easier to find.

Backup and sync settings

Your photos are backed up for a specific Google account. However, you can manage accounts, choose photos to back up, and more. In the upper left corner, select three lines => Settings => Startup and sync:

•  Active account – the account with which the photos from your device are synchronized has been written, as well as the amount of space on it for the photo with the original size (As it was written earlier – high quality photos can be uploaded to the account in any volume). To change the active account – you need to click on the three lines at the top left => select the arrow next to your account name, here you can delete the current account and add a new one;

• Photo size – by clicking on this field, you can change the size of the photos: standard – good quality and you can upload photos as much as you want; or original – the original size of the photo, the volume for them in the cloud is limited;

• Additional place – by clicking on this item, you can purchase, for a fee, additional space to store photos of the original size;
• Auto upload photos – you can choose when to sync photos with the cloud, only when Wi-Fi is connected, or via Wi-Fi and mobile networks;

• Backup folders – maybe you still have folders with photos on your device, if you want them to be synchronized with the cloud, check the boxes on the necessary folders, after which the photos will start downloading from them to the cloud;

• Roaming – check the box if you agree to sync photos when you are roaming;
• Only when charging – if you check this box, then synchronization will take place only when the device is connected to a charger.

Delete photos and videos from the device immediately after uploading them to the cloud

You can not store photos and videos on your device, but immediately after uploading them to the cloud, delete them from the device. This will help save space on your device, but offline – you will be deprived of your photos. If you go to the three lines at the top right, select “Settings” and click on “Free up space on the device” – the scan of your device will start and at the end you will see a window with information on how much space you can free up. If you agree to delete photos from your device and leave them only in the cloud, click “Delete”.

On device

Another way to select the folders on your device that you want to sync (back up) with the cloud is to click on the three lines at the top left and select “On Device”. A lot of folders on your device will open in front of you, there is a cloud above each folder – click on this cloud to enable or disable the synchronization of this folder.

Select multiple photos with one click

Google Photos provides various ways to quickly select a burst of photos. For example, you can press your finger on a photo and hold your finger until the choice appears, then without releasing your finger from the screen, slide it up, down or to the side to select the desired photos. You can also click on a date and all photos for this date will be highlighted.

Delete photos

In the Google Photos application, if you accidentally delete a photo, it does not disappear, but is stored for another 60 days in the hope of resurrection ? For example, your child accidentally deleted all the photos, what should I do? Just go to the three lines at the top left and select “Trash”, all deleted photos will be here. Photos from the trash can disappear 60 days after they are deleted. Agree, this time will be enough for you to come to your senses. Also in it you can click on the three dots in the upper right and select “Empty Trash”

Google Photos desktop app

As I said earlier, hard drives sometimes fill up in computers, and you can lose your entire home photo library without the possibility of recovering them. Although now there are tough new generations from which information is not lost, but many users still use the old ones. Therefore, I recommend using the Google Photos app on your computer.

You can download all albums from the cloud in one archive and from any device with Internet access. The main thing is to remember your account information in order to access your albums.

If you are using Google Drive, you can add the Google Photos folder to it. And also display photos and videos from Google Drive in Google Photos, to do this, go to the application settings and enable this function.

Google Photos has many features, which will become more and more over time. The most useful of them at the moment, we have described in today’s article. If there are additions – write comments! Good luck ?