Migrating a large collection of photos to iCloud photos

[MrMars]

I’d like to start utilizing my Mac/iPhone for my photo collection. I currently have all the photos (17k +) in a folder on my Mac desktop. What is the best way to get all these photos into iCloud photos?

 

[Tartarus]

After upgrading your iCloud account to 50GB or even 200GB, simply enable iCloud Photo Library in Settings > iCloud and you’re good to go.

 

[MrMars]

After upgrading your iCloud account to 50GB or even 200GB, simply enable iCloud Photo Library in Settings > iCloud and you’re good to go.

There must be something else necessary. I’m currently on the 200GB plan. From my Mac do I need to tell photos to look to the folder where all the pics are stored?

 

[MrMars]

I’d like to jump ship from Amazon Photos so I downloaded all the photos from Amazon Photos to a folder that I created on my Mac desktop. I just don’t know how to get them all into my Apple photo library.

 

[Tartarus]

I’d like to jump ship from Amazon Photos so I downloaded all the photos from Amazon Photos to a folder that I created on my Mac desktop. I just don’t know how to get them all into my Apple photo library.

You should put those photos in the Photos app on your Mac. I’m not sure if you can assign a different folder for iCloud Photo Library.

 

[MrMars]

You should put those photos in the Photos app on your Mac. I’m not sure if you can assign a different folder for iCloud Photo Library.

I’ve tried doing that via the import option but after it runs for a certain period of time I get an error that says 14,000 of them or so cannot be imported and I’m not sure why.

I’m starting to think that due to the size of my collection that maybe I should just give up since it’s all working OK in Amazon Photos

 

[Tartarus]

I’ve tried doing that via the import option but after it runs for a certain period of time I get an error that says 14,000 of them or so cannot be imported and I’m not sure why.

I’m starting to think that due to the size of my collection that maybe I should just give up since it’s all working OK in Amazon Photos

I’m sorry to hear you’re running into problems. Maybe make 14 folders, with each a 1,000 photos in them and import them in batches. That way the possibility for errors is drastically reduced.

Hopefully someone else with a better, practical solution will come along and help you out.

 

[MrMars]

After thinking about it. I wonder if it would work better if instead of having all the pictures in an iCloud folder on my desktop that I created a local folder on my hard drive for all the pictures and then tried importing them from that...

 

[Tartarus]

Let me know when you try this. Don’t forget to make backups, though.

 

[MrMars]

Let me know when you try this. Don’t forget to make backups, though.

I plan on trying this later when I get home. And I do still have all the pictures in Amazon Photos

 

[MrMars]

Ok...made some serious progress on this since I've been home. I moved all the pictures from the iCloud folder on my Mac desktop to a folder on my local hard drive then I was able to import all 17k + photos to Apple photos successfully. Now its just a matter of all the features like people, places, etc... to settle in. Thanks for your help!