[iMore Question]

Hi. I just received a phone swap from Verizon and I wanted to move everything, including all the data my apps have, to my new iPhone. I tried this already via iTunes with an encrypted backup and I am only getting about 9gb of data in the backup (mostly pictures) instead of the 50-ish gb on the phone.

Thanks.

[njlx2016]

iTunes and iCloud backups do not* backup content that can be retrieved from the cloud. This data includes apps, iTunes content and your photos if you have iCloud Photo Library enabled.

*During the backup process, this content is marked as part of the backup but not actually included in it. When you restore from a backup, it is re-downloaded from the cloud as long as it's still available.

Performing an encrypted iTunes backup or iCloud backup is the only way to ensure a seamless transition from one device to another.

Further reading:
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203977
https://support.apple.com/en-us/ht204184

[Ledsteplin]

Welcome to iMore! My storage space on my iPhone uses about 50ish gb. But my back up is only about 2.5 gb in iCloud. I don't back up photos. Apps on the phone's storage take up a good bit more space than app documents and data in iCloud. Just make sure your apps are enabled to save the data. Toggle them on in settlngs > iCloud. Go all the way to the end and you'll see a list of apps.