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Optimizing Photo Storage: A Breath of Fresh Air for Your Mac

Optimizing Photo Storage: A Breath of Fresh Air for Your Mac

By Zoltán G.Zoltán G. Verified by Sander D.Sander D. Last updated: July 18, 2024 (0)
Table of contents

Taking photos has never been as easy, as fun or as common as it is right now, and that’s mostly thanks to the spread of smart devices, making it an activity that virtually anybody can take part in. However, it does come with a not-so-tiny problem: none of the cameras in modern smart devices can take great quality pictures that are less than 1MB. So unless you do something about your pictures, they’ll soon start to occupy the already limited space on your iPhone/iPad or computer, forcing it to underperform in every aspect: speed, processing, loading and more. This is why it is essential to maintain your photo library – and without having to copy/paste everything to a brutally expensive hard drive.

Removing duplicates

Storing the same file in two or more folders at the same time is anything but wise, so the first thing to do is to get rid of any duplicates. A convenient way to do so is by using a duplicate file removal tool like Gemini, but you can also follow the steps for removing large files and find out whether you have unwanted copies of certain pictures or not.

Compressing, compressing, and compressing

You can save tons of disk space if you know how to reduce file sizes correctly. One such way is to transform your PNG pictures to JPG (although most devices use the latter format) or to simply resize or crop the picture to your liking. Better yet, there are countless online or offline compressors – such as ImageOptim or TinyPNG, two programs we constantly use. And best of all, you likely won’t even notice the difference with resized images.

Going online with iCloud

Unlike your computer, the cloud can have unlimited storage – of course, provided that you pay for it. This is the case with iCloud which offers 5GB of storage space for free, but if you need more you can choose 50GB for – and this is not a joke – $0.99 per month.

All you have to do is activate the automatic iCloud syncing by going to Apple Menu > About This Mac > Storage > Manage and then selecting “Store” in iCloud. From then on every photo added to your photo library will also appear in iCloud as well. However, once your physical storage is starting to get crowded, iCloud deletes most of your original, full-resolution photos, replacing them with optimized versions while keeping the original files in the clouds.

Although this is a convenient way of reducing storage space and you will always have the option to download the original files back onto your Mac (or any other Apple device for that matter), keep in mind that these items need internet access to be viewed in their original glory. Another problem is that each time you view pictures stored in iCloud with no copy of it stored on your hard drive, a locally cached copy is created that gets even worse when importing raw files. To avoid this, it is highly recommended to use a Mac optimizer, which can free up valuable space on your device while leaving any photos stored in iCloud untouched.


Best Mac optimization software of 2025

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