Are Google Photos Private?

Many Android phones now come with Google Photos pre-installed, but many iPhone users also opt to install it for use in place of Apple’s native gallery. On the app’s home screen, Google Photos displays all of the images taken with your phone’s camera as standard, but if you go into Albums on Android, you’ll also see various device directories, whether they’re the default folders or those that you have created yourself.

When Google Photos was transformed into its own platform, everybody’s media was preserved, but did everything remain private?

Are The Photos Stored On Google Photos Private?

The media you save in Google Photos will always be private and only accessible by the account holder, so there’s no need to worry about other people viewing, editing, downloading or deleting your private images and videos.

It’s important to note that Google Photos is not a social media platform, so your photographs are not accessible through your Google profile or any other means. So, until you explicitly share a picture or video it is only visible by logging into your personal account.

No one else can see them unless you share them with them; however, if you switch on backup or manually backup a picture to Google Photos, it will appear on all of your other devices that are connected in with the same Google account, so another person could inadvertently discover your media if they’re using your device.

This being said, if you do want to share your media and make it public, it is very easy to do so.

How To Share Your Google Photos Media

If you’re intentionally trying to share media that is stored on Google Photos, it is very easy to do so and there are multiple ways of going about it.

These methods include sharing with a link, sharing across to other users within the Google Photos platform, and creating a partner account. The simplest of these options is the first – sharing your Google Photos via a link:

When you press or click the share symbol in Google Photos, you’ll be given the choice to ‘Create a link’. You may share the link with anybody outside of Google Photos after it’s been generated. Anyone with access to that URL may now see the shared image.

If you want to simply share your images or videos with another Google Photos user, there’s another sharing option for you to utilise:

Users of Google Photos, recognised by the Google Photos symbol on their picture, may also be found under the share icon. Only they will be able to see the picture if you share it with them. You may also collaborate with other Google Photos users to build ‘Shared Albums’.

If you find yourself always sharing your Google Photos media with the same person, you can add another account as a “partner account”.

When you establish a Google Photos partner account, you may specify certain criteria that will automatically share specific photographs with that account.

How To Create A Partner Account On Google Photos

Creating a partner account is obviously not as fast as using a share link to share a specific image, but if you share a lot of media with the same account you will definitely save a lot of time in the long run. Your account can only be linked with one other partner account, though, so choose wisely.

Here’s how to create a partner account on Google Photos:

1. Open the Google Photos app on your android device.
2. Make sure you’re signed in to your Google Photos account and click either your profile picture or your initial.
3. Go to ‘Photos Settings’, then ‘Partner Sharing’, then ‘Get Started’.
4. Enter the email address of the person you want to share your media with, bearing in mind that they must already have a Google account themselves.
5. Select the media that you want to automatically share with your partner. It can be all images, photos of specific people, or all images since a specific date, for example.
6. Tap ‘Next’, then ‘Send Invitation’ after you’ve evaluated your choices.

If you want to see your partner’s photos, they will need to send you an invitation back. You’ll have to stop sharing with your existing partner if you want to partner share with someone else or receive an invitation.

How To View Shared Media On Google Photos

Under the Sharing tab of the Google Photos application or website, you’ll discover a list of all the shared media, including their associated albums. To access the shared files on your computer, go to the ‘Sharing’ page.

In this section, you’re also able to stop sharing with anyone you’ve sent a link to or partnered with. To do this, click the three dots menu icon and toggle the share button to its off position.

How To Archive Media On Google Photos

We sometimes wish to remove particular images from Google Photos, and it’s reasonable to believe that deleting them is the only choice. However, this is not the case; you may archive the photos instead.

When you archive a picture, it disappears from the app’s primary display. Those photographs are still accessible in the app’s Archived area, where you may also unarchive them.

Open a picture and press the three-dot symbol in the top-right corner to archive it. Choose the Archive option from the drop-down menu. To archive the photos, you don’t need to save them to the Google Photos collection. All sorts of images may be archived, whether or whether they are backed up.