iCloud and iCloud Drive

[Mannheim62]

My niece just upgraded from the iPhone 6+ to the 11 and is having problems with backups. She is using iCloud Drive with the 50 YES 50 GB plan ... mostly photos. She gets a message about not enough space to back up. My thinking is: even though she's not using the 6+any longer, iCloud Drive still stores it's backup. Please correct me if I'm wrong. She says that all of her information including photos transferred over from the 6+ to the 11; so that's good. I guess my question is this: What's the best way to remove the 6+ from syncing to iCloud in order to free up space? Is it a simple as connecting the 6+ to wifi and signing out of all accounts including iCloud? What I want to avoid is doing this incorrectly and she loses all her photos on the new phone.

As always, I want to say thank you in advance for any help or suggestions,

Mike

 

[Raz0rEdge]

If she isn't using the 6+, it should definitely be disconnected from her Apple ID/iCloud account so that it isn't being backed up unnecessarily.

From a usage perspective, on the 11, she should go to Settings, then her Apple ID on top, then iCloud, then Manage Storage and see where all the data is coming from. There'll see you see things like Photos, iCloud Drive, Backups, and then apps. If Backups lists both the devices, then that's one of the things that can be removed. If the rest of data is adding up close to 50GB and none of it can be removed, then your only option is to upgrade to 200GB or 2TB plans, very interesting jumps indeed in size and price.

 

[chscag]

First, we moved this post to the correct forum. It is not a lounge subject.

She can access her iCloud account directly from her phone or her Mac/PC using her Apple ID and password. From there she can delete any old backups and make corrections to her account. She can also remove the 6+ from the list of her devices. She will not lose the photos on her new phone. But as always, it's a good idea to first backup things like photos to another device for safe keeping. (Mac, PC)

 

[ferrarr]

I just looked on my iPhone 11, and listed under iCloud Storage > Backups, it shows both my devices, but the backups only take up 427.5 MB (iPad Pro) and 285.8 MB (iPhone).

 

[Mannheim62]

If she isn't using the 6+, it should definitely be disconnected from her Apple ID/iCloud account so that it isn't being backed up unnecessarily.

From a usage perspective, on the 11, she should go to Settings, then her Apple ID on top, then iCloud, then Manage Storage and see where all the data is coming from. There'll see you see things like Photos, iCloud Drive, Backups, and then apps. If Backups lists both the devices, then that's one of the things that can be removed. If the rest of data is adding up close to 50GB and none of it can be removed, then your only option is to upgrade to 200GB or 2TB plans, very interesting jumps indeed in size and price.

I understand Ashwin, thank you for your reply. Mike

 

[Mannheim62]

First, we moved this post to the correct forum. It is not a lounge subject.

She can access her iCloud account directly from her phone or her Mac/PC using her Apple ID and password. From there she can delete any old backups and make corrections to her account. She can also remove the 6+ from the list of her devices. She will not lose the photos on her new phone. But as always, it's a good idea to first backup things like photos to another device for safe keeping. (Mac, PC)

Thank you for moving my post to the correct forum, much appreciated. We've already backed up all her photos to her PC. She also bought a new MacBook Air but doesn't need all the photos stored locally on her HD. Thank you for replying, Mike

 

[chscag]

I just looked on my iPhone 11, and listed under iCloud Storage > Backups, it shows both my devices, but the backups only take up 427.5 MB (iPad Pro) and 285.8 MB (iPhone).

How come your backups are so small? I looked at my backups on my iMac (iPhone 8, iPad Pro, iPhone 11) and they add up to around 10GB. Your backups are either compressed or you're not backing up all your data.

 

[Mannheim62]

I just looked on my iPhone 11, and listed under iCloud Storage > Backups, it shows both my devices, but the backups only take up 427.5 MB (iPad Pro) and 285.8 MB (iPhone).

Thank you so much, looks like we have work to do. Mike

 

[Raz0rEdge]

I just looked on my iPhone 11, and listed under iCloud Storage > Backups, it shows both my devices, but the backups only take up 427.5 MB (iPad Pro) and 285.8 MB (iPhone).

My single backup is 5.8GB. You must not have much on your phone at all perhaps?

 

[ferrarr]

How come your backups are so small? I looked at my backups on my iMac (iPhone 8, iPad Pro, iPhone 11) and they add up to around 10GB. Your backups are either compressed or you're not backing up all your data.

My iPhone is 128 GB, and 77 GB are used.

What else do you think it needs to backup?

What about when you check your iPhone? Settings > Apple ID > iCloud > Manage Storage > Backups?

 

[RadDave]

My iPhone is 128 GB, and 77 GB are used.

What else do you think it needs to backup?

What about when you check your iPhone? Settings > Apple ID > iCloud > Manage Storage > Backups?

Well, I'd have to agree w/ Charlie & Ashwin, i.e. less that 1/2 GB on the iPad & iPhone is just not enough for an iCloud BU of either device? Below is a pic of my iPad Pro & iPhone XR BUs which total 15.5 GB - 12.5 GB for my iPad & 3.0 GB for the iPhone (the iPad has about 64 GB of 256 GB used; iPhone only 24/128 GB) - Dave

.

 

[chscag]

What else do you think it needs to backup?

I don't know since it's your phone. But with that amount of storage used on your phone that you gave, it seems your backup is way short. Have you ever had to restore from a backup?

My devices are only using around ¼ of their available storage but yet my backups are consuming around 10GB. (combined)

 

[Lifeisabeach]

When using iCloud for backups, Apple doesn't count your actual apps against your iCloud storage space because they don't back those up specifically. They re-download them from the App Store servers if need be. Now if you back up locally, then yes, your apps are included in those backups.