With push into service covering music, video, fitness and more, Apple has removed some of the bricks from its walled garden, giving Windows and Android users access to more of its apps and products – including iCloud Photos. There’s now a new level of integration with Windows 11, as well as an improved web app experience.
sure, You’ll probably only choose iCloud Photos for your photo and video management needs if you have an iPhone or a Mac, but if you need access to them Your files from non-Apple devices – or share your recorded content with others who haven’t invested just as much in the Apple ecosystem You have – then it’s a lot easier than it used to be.
iCloud Photos on Windows
iCloud for Windows has been around for a number of years and offers you a simple portal to access your photos and videos from computers running the Microsoft operating system and to upload photos and videos to Apple’s servers. The application isn’t as sophisticated, but it does cover contacts, calendar, and iCloud Drive files. to.
Now, There are also iCloud Photos integration in the native Photos app for Windows11– Pictures and videos from your Apple devices can be displayed right next to content from OneDrive and the files on your local hard drive. If Windows 11 is up to date, you should also have the latest version of the Photos app (click windows update of settings) and you must also have iCloud for Windows installed.
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It’s the iCloud for Windows program that handles all the required login and authentication: you will, Naturally, need your Apple ID username and password. When setting up this application, make sure that the photos Option is enabled so iCloud knows you want to sync your pictures and videos to the current computer.
You can then launch the Microsoft Photos app from the Start menu. Click the gear icon in the top right and click under the Personalization heading You should see one View iCloud Photos toggle switch. That adds a iCloud Photos Option to click in the navigation pane on the left (if you haven’t already installed iCloud for Windows you will be prompted to do so).
The iCloud Photos page is structured the same as the others, with the interface adapting to the orientation of your photos. If you go to All fotos On this page, you’ll see that iCloud Photos files have their own little sticker to distinguish them from other images and videos — and you can use the standard tools (including editing and searching) with iCloud files the same way you do with any other screen in the app.
iCloud photos on the web
There are also iCloud photos on the web, which is another option if you’re on a Windows computer, and almost your only option on an Android device — unless you’re going to do something complicated with another service acting as an intermediary. Now that apple music is on Android, there’s a chance iCloud Photos will follow, but for now we’re not holding our breath.
Apple is currently working on a revised version of the iCloud web apps, which you may or may not see when you log into the portal. The changes mostly affect the front page of the site and not the photo component, at least for now, so there’s not that much Difference in working with your photos and videos.
The navigation pane on the left lets you navigate through your files: you’ll see your most recent photos and videos first, but you can jump to individual albums with a few clicks. Select an image and you will be given share, download and delete options in the top right corner. You can also adjust the size of the thumbnails using the slider at the top. next to the navigation pane on the left.
There’s still a lot missing from the iCloud Photos web portal. For example, you can search for images or videos, but there are no editing functions either. You can upload pictures from your computer or phone – you will see the upload button (an arrow pointing inwardsto a cloud icon) in the top right corner.
On the plus side, the UI scales fairly well across mobile browsers, so the experience on Android isn’t bad – as long as you just want to scroll through your photos and videos and maybe download one or two of them occasionally. So far, there is no official option to sync photos and videos taken with an Android phone to iCloud, so you need to send them through a third party like Dropbox or Google Photos.
