With cameras so readily available, it’s easy to accumulate more photos than you know what to do with. You probably take dozens of pictures when you go out, meet up with friends, or go on vacation. And while taking photos is fun, organizing them is work. But it doesn't have to be that way. In this article, we’ll show you how to organize pictures on your Mac with the Photos app and without it. Here are the things you’ll be reading about:

1. Mac Photos To Amazon Photos
2. Mac Photos Library Amazon Photos How To Transfer Pictures
3. Mac Photos Library Amazon Photos How To Transfer
4. Mac Photos Library Amazon Photos How To Transfer Photos

• How to merge your photo libraries in the Photos app
• How to group pictures using Smart Albums in Photos
• Tricks for keeping your Photos library organized
• How to organize pictures outside of the Photos app

Tips to help organize photos on a Mac

1. Consolidate an all your photos in the Photos app for Mac

When macOS Yosemite was released in 2014, the Photos app finally came to Macs, replacing outdated iPhoto. Now with Photos, you’ve got more organization tools, including the ability to switch between libraries and merge them. To start with, let’s get all of your photos from different places onto your Mac. Here’s what you should do:

1. Use iCloud Photo Library to ensure that everything you take on an iOS device is synced automatically with your Mac. Alternatively, AirDrop photos from your iPhone and/or iPad to your Mac.
2. Import photos from external drives to the Photos app on your Mac
3. Import photos from your camera
4. If you have several libraries in the Photos app, merge them into one

Once everything is on your Mac and in one library, it’s easier to get organized. Let’s take a look at a few questions most people have when they juggle several Photos libraries.

How to get rid of duplicate Photos?

The next thing is to get rid of the duplicate and similar-looking pictures that are wasting space on your hard drive.Thankfully, the app Gemini 2 can scan your entire hard drive to quickly find and get rid of them. After you’ve downloaded and installed Gemini 2, you can follow these steps to declutter your photos:

1. Download Gemini 2 for free, install and launch the app.
2. Click + > Pictures Folder.
3. Then, click Scan for Duplicates and let it go.
4. Choose either Review Results or Smart Cleanup.

Review Results does exactly what it promises and will let you see your duplicate files grouped together, making it that much easier to decide which version you want to delete. While Smart Cleanup will get rid of your duplicates with just one click.

In your My Photo Stream section of your Photos, right click on the photo you want to keep on your computer. Select Save to download it to your Photos app. 39 X Research source If you don’t save the photos on your Mac, they’ll disappear from your computer after 30 days, but they’ll still be saved on your iPhone.

1. Back up the library in Photos on Mac. Even if you use iCloud Photos, it’s important that you always back up your library locally using one of the following methods. Use Time Machine: After you set up Time Machine, it automatically backs up the files on your Mac.
2. Connect your iPhone or iPad to your Mac and transfer photos into the Photos app on your Mac: If you don’t use iCloud Photos on your Mac, you can sync an iPhone or iPad to your Mac to transfer photos. See Sync photos between your Mac and iPhone or iPad.

How do I switch libraries in Photos?

Libraries in Photos can come from a few different sources, including external devices such as cameras and iPhones. If you were using iPhoto prior to Photos, each device and source will have a Systems Photo Library. You can switch between them, and here is how you do that:

1. Go to Launchpad
2. Hold down the Option key, and then double-click on the Photos app to see the libraries you have on this device
3. Now you can move easily from one photo library to another and open the one you want by double-clicking it

How to create a new Photo library on Mac?

Creating a new library is easy. If Photos is open, you’ll need to quit and reopen to create a new library:

1. Hold down the Option key
2. Double-click on the Photos apps
3. Click the Create New button, then choose Library
4. Give your new library a name and click OK

How to merge two or more Photos libraries?

At present, there is no native macOS tool for merging libraries in Photos. Essentially, what you’ll be doing is moving all pics to one new library. So, create one as described above, and then follow these steps:

1. Launch Photos holding down the Option key and select one the libraries you want to merge
2. In the menu bar, click Edit > Select All
3. Again in the menu bar, select File > Export. Now you’ve got the following options:

• Export Unmodified Original. This will export every image in these libraries, excluding any edits or changes made to them.
• Export [number of photos you want to export] Photos, which gives you the option to pick a format and select Full Size. That will export your photos as they are, with any edits you’ve made, in TIFF, PNG, or JPEG formats.

Pick where they’re going (this could be a folder on your Mac or a connected external drive, for example)

Mac Photos To Amazon Photos

Repeat these steps for the other libraries you want merged

Now close Photos and re-open using Option to select the library you are merging these photos into

Either use File > Import or drag the exported photos into the library

How do I delete a Photo library from my Mac?

If you want to delete a library, it’s super easy. You just navigate to the Pictures folder on your Mac, locate the library you want gone, and move it to the Trash. However, you’ll want to make sure you’ve got all the images and videos out of it first. Export them like we described in the previous section, and then trash the library.

2. Use Smart Albums in Photos to organize your pics

After merging your libraries and clearing out duplicates and similar images, take photo organizing one step further and group the remaining pics with Smart Albums. Let’s take a look at how to use this fantastic feature of the Photos app to your advantage.

What is a Smart Album in Photos?

Mac Photos Library Amazon Photos How To Transfer Pictures

Smart Albums are a way of grouping images by the parameters you set. Maybe you’ll want an album to contain photos taken last Christmas, or you’d rather group all the pics of your kid together. All that and more can be done with a Smart Album. As is the case with a regular Photos album, you can edit and delete it.

How to make a new Smart Album in Photos?

Creating a new Smart Album is simple:

1. Launch Photos
2. Click the + button next to My Albums in the sidebar
3. Select Smart Album<
4. Give your Smart Album a name
5. Choose the Parameters, e.g. “kids,” “days out,” “Holiday 2018.” You can modify these at any time.
6. Click OK to create

By developing a system (e.g., photos are grouped into albums by date taken) and using Smart Albums, you’ll make sure your photo library is easy to navigate, even if it contains thousands of photos from 2001 and up until now.

3. Other tricks for keeping your Photos library organized

Now that you’ve got your libraries consolidated and you’re using Smart Folders, here are a couple more tricks to help keep your pictures organized.

How to favorite Photos?

The more pictures you have in your Photos app, the harder it can be to find the picture you’re looking for. A simple way to view only the photos that are important to you is to favorite them. You can favorite an image in the Photos app either by:

• Selecting a picture and clicking the heart button in the toolbar.
• Hover your mouse over an image and click the heart in the bottom left corner.

Then, you can view all the pictures you’ve favorited by clicking Favorites in the left sidebar.

How to find faces on Photos?

Photos also has a facial recognition feature, which is great when you’re looking for pictures of a specific person. But it’s definitely not without its flaws. It will identify faces and make suggestions, but it requires you to put in some time to either verify the people in a picture or label them yourself. To view your pictures organized by faces:

1. Click People in the sidebar.
2. Select one of the people to view all of their photos.

How to create a shared album?

Shared albums are a collaborative way to share photos with your family friends. Everyone can drop their pictures from a specific event or place into one place. Follow these steps to create a Share album:

1. In the left sidebar of Photos, hover over Shared Albums.
2. Click the +.
3. Name your album and invite people to collaborate.
4. Click Create.
5. Click All Photos in the sidebar.
6. Drag and drop the pictures you want to add to that album.

If you forget to add someone when you’re creating the album, don’t worry. You can always add people to an album by clicking the button that looks like a person in a circle in the toolbar.

How to navigate through years and months?

Probably the most common way to view your photos is by the date they were taken. In the toolbar at the top, you can select to group your pictures by year, month, or even by date.

Even if you’re viewing your pictures in the All Photos tab, you’re still scrolling through them by date. You can use the scale slider to zoom out and see more photos from a time period or zoom in to see a specific period.

4. How to organize photos outside the Photos app

Of course, you don’t need the Photos app to organize your pictures. You can manage them within folders as you do with your documents or downloads. For some, this way maybe a little more difficult because you’re not able to see all of your pics simultaneously. But this does make it easier to transfer your photos or store them on an external hard drive.

Tip:

When you’re not storing your pictures in the Photos app, it does make it harder to spot duplicates, though. So you should use an app like Gemini 2 and periodically scan for duplicate or similar-looking photos.

The app will scan your hard drive to show you copies of the same picture that are just wasting space. You can get rid of your duplicates with one click of the Smart Cleanup button or you can review the files Gemini 2 finds to decide which copies you want to delete. And the best part is you can download Gemini 2 and try it for free!

How to find all photos on Mac?

If you have pictures everywhere on your computer and you’re wondering how to find the photo files on your Mac, the easiest way is with Smart Folders in Finder. Setting up a Smart Folder will allow you to see all of your pictures in one Finder window, regardless of where they’re actually stored. To set up a Smart Folder for your pictures:

1. In a new Finder window, click File > New Smart Folder.
2. Click “This Mac” and then click the + in the right corner.
3. From the drop-down menus, change Name to Kind and Any to Image.
4. If you want to save the Smart Folder so you can come back to it, click Save and then name the folder.

But the best way to organize your photos on a Mac is in a detailed folder structure, typically by date of when you took the pictures. And once you have a Smart Folder where you can find and see all of your photos in one place, it makes it a little bit easier to sort and organize them into easy-to-navigate folders.

How to view pictures on Mac?

Viewing pictures on a Mac without Photos is easy, but can get tedious really quickly. You can use Preview to open and view your pictures. The major drawback to doing this is you first have to find the photo file(s) in Finder and then double-click to open them with Preview.

That’s it, hope this short guide helps you cope with your photo overload. And remember: the best way to organize photos on your Mac is to keep your library lean and manageable — free from clutter and useless copies. Gemini 2 will gladly help with that.

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Photos and videos are likely to be some of your most precious digital possessions. They represent snapshots of loved ones, special places, memorable events, incredible trips, and even some moments that will have you laughing for years to come. We take a lot of these with our smartphone cameras, so we might as well make sure they’re safe and looked after.

The good news is that there are numerous apps and services that will take good care of your images, and if you decide to move them, it is possible to make the switch without too much of a hassle.

If you think Instagram and Snapchat are already doing a pretty good job for you, keep in mind these are great for quick and fast mobile sharing, but they are not designed for managing several years’ worth of accumulated images in bulk. They also work as a publishing platform rather than a storage service, so for this guide, we’ll concentrate on platforms such as Google Photos and Apple’s iCloud Photo Library.

Get comfortable and open your laptop, because you’ll need to do some heavy lifting for this job. Phone apps are simply less capable than full-blown computers when it comes to downloading and uploading entire archives of images and videos.

Google Photos

Importing

Google Photos lives on the web, and you’ve got a couple of options for getting photos and videos up into the cloud. First, you can load up Google Photos on your browser, then simply drag files and folders across from File Explorer (Windows) or Finder (macOS). If you find it easier, click Upload, then Computer at the top of the Google Photos web interface, and upload your files.

For an even easier way to get your files in the cloud, download Google’s Backup and Sync tool for Windows or macOS. It lets you specify certain folders on your computer that will be automatically synced with Google Photos: anything new you add to those specific folders will be uploaded to the web.

Exporting

Downloading one or two photos from Google Photos is easy enough—just select the files from the web interface, click the Menu button (three dots), and choose Download. If you’ve selected multiple files, they will be wrapped up in a zip file. When you’ve downloaded what you need, you can move those photos and videos somewhere else.

If you need to get absolutely everything out of your Google Photos account, head to the Google Takeout service on the web. Make sure Google Photos is the only box checked, then choose Next step and select Send download link via email from the top drop-down menu. Click Create archive and then wait for the link to that archive (including your selected photos and videos) to appear in your Gmail inbox.

Apple iCloud Photo Library

Importing

The Photos app on Mac takes care of syncing files between your computer and the cloud. To add new pictures and videos to your iCloud Photo Library, first open the Photos menu in the Photos app, choose Preferences, find General, and make sure the box marked Copy items to the Photos library is checked. Then, choose File and Import, and pick the relevant files.

If you’re using iCloud on the web, you can import photos and videos to iCloud Photo Library by clicking the Upload button (an arrow pointing up into a cloud), then choosing the files you want to upload from your disk. If you’re on Windows, the iCloud for Windows app does a basic, but competent, job—you can specify which photo and video folders on your computer should sync to the cloud by clicking Options (next to Photos) on the main dialog.

Exporting

If you’re using a Mac, your iCloud Photo Library in your computer will sync to the cloud in a bespoke Apple-designed database that doesn’t really play nice with other apps and services. To get your files into “normal” formats that other upload tools will recognize, you’ll need to export them. Choose File, Export, then Export Unmodified Originals, and pick a new location on your disk. You can export individual files, groups of files, or entire albums.

The iCloud web interface for Photos lets you export images and videos in standard formats as well, but it’s a slow process—you’ll need to individually select files, then click Download (the arrow pointing down out of a cloud). The iCloud for Windows program can help with that—if you click Options (next to Photos on the main dialog), you can specify a folder on the disk to save all your iCloud photos and videos.

Facebook

Importing

If you’ve chosen Facebook as the place to host your most precious pictures, you can get them up to the site via your web browser—that Photo/Video button at the top of the News Feed is the one you want. Alternatively, head to your Facebook profile page, then click Photos. From there, choose Add Photos/Videos to upload just a handful of files (or just one), or Create Album to put a select group of photos and videos in one place.

Facebook is built around sharing, but you don’t have to share uploaded images and videos with the wider world if you don’t want to. Make sure you change the Audience Selector box (which will usually say Friends by default) to Only Me (or whatever audience you want)—this determines who can see the files and folders you’re uploading.

Exporting

Downloading individual photos and videos from Facebook is easy enough—open up the file in your web browser, hover over it, then choose Options and Download.

To get all the photos and videos you’ve ever uploaded to the world’s biggest social network, head to the Facebook settings page on the web, then select Your Facebook information. Click View next to Download your information, check the box marked Photos and videos (make sure the Media quality setting is High), and select Create File. You will get an email to your registered address with a download link containing a zip file with all of your photos and videos, ready to be uploaded to another platform.

Amazon Photos

Importing

If you’re a Prime subscriber, you get unlimited online storage for your photos and videos as part of the deal. To get files into your Amazon Drive, you can download the desktop app for Windows or macOS. From the Backup pane, you can have the app scan your computer for photos and videos, or point it toward specific folders to sync to the cloud. Any new files you add to those folders will automatically be uploaded to the web.

Alternatively, open the Amazon Photos web interface and click Add, then Upload photos or Upload folder. This is just basic uploading, on both the web and through the desktop apps. If you want to create albums, though, you’ll need to do this manually: click Add, then Create album.

Exporting

To get your movies and pictures out of Amazon Photos and ready to put somewhere else, the best option is the desktop tool we’ve already mentioned. Switch to the Download pane inside the app, pick Download folder(s), then select the Pictures folder from your Amazon Drive (assuming you want to download everything). Click Download and pick a folder on your computer for the files.

You can download photos and videos from the web interface as well, but this is more for one or two files at a time. Select one or more files, then Download, and your browser will start the process of saving the chosen files to the disk. If you’ve picked several files, the platform will package the photos together in a zip file.

Flickr

Importing

Mac Photos Library Amazon Photos How To Transfer

If you need to get photos or videos onto Flickr, one way is to click the little Upload button on the toolbar at the top of the Flickr web interface (the button looks like an up arrow going into a cloud). Choose some files from your disk or drag them into the browser to add them to your Flickr library.

Another option, which is easier if you’ve got dozens or hundreds of images and clips to move around, is to use the Flickr Uploadr for Windows or macOS. This is only available to those with a Pro account, though ($5 a month or $50 a year), but if you need to shift a substantial number of photos, it’s probably worth the investment.

Mac Photos Library Amazon Photos How To Transfer Photos

Exporting

To get everything out of your Flickr account, you’ll need to go to your account settings page on the web, then click Request my Flickr data. You’ll get an email with a download link you can click on to save a zip file with all your images to your computer.

Alternatively, you can download your pictures and videos through the standard Flickr web interface. Click the download icon (a down arrow) on an album, a picture, or a video—if you’ve chosen an album, the system will pack your images into a zip file and send an email to your registered address with a link to download it.

Bonus: Get your content from Instagram and Snapchat

Yes, these apps are social media platforms, not storage services, but we still keep a lot of our photos and videos on them. If you already have a substantial part of your life living on Instagram and Snapchat, know that you can download it and back it up wherever you want.

On Instagram, tap your Profile (bottom right), then the Menu button (top right), followed by Settings, Security, and Download data. On Snapchat, go to the photo library page (tap the button below the shutter button on the camera screen), select your images and videos, and choose Export.