How to Back Up Photos to Cloud and External Drive

Secure your digital memories. Follow this step-by-step guide to back up photos to iCloud and external storage for a reliable redundant backup strategy.

  1. Enable iCloud Photos sync. Open Settings on your iPhone. Tap your Apple ID banner, select iCloud, tap Photos, and toggle on Sync this iPhone. This ensures all current and future captures are automatically uploaded to your iCloud account.
  2. Prepare the external drive. Connect your external SSD to your Mac using a high-speed USB-C cable. Open Disk Utility from Applications > Utilities and ensure the drive is formatted as APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled) for optimal compatibility.
  3. Create a dedicated backup folder. Open Finder and navigate to your external drive. Right-click in the empty space, select New Folder, and name it PhotoBackup_2026. This creates a clear destination for your full-resolution original files.
  4. Export original files from Photos. Launch the Photos app on your Mac. Press Cmd + A to select your entire library, then navigate to File > Export > Export Unmodified Originals. Select your external drive folder as the destination and click Export.
  5. Confirm data integrity. Open the folder on your external drive to ensure all files have successfully migrated. Verify that file counts match the library totals in the Photos application.

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