How to Delete Photos From iCloud While Keeping Them on the iPhone
To delete photos from iCloud without deleting them from the iPhone, you need to check your phone’s syncing status. Be sure syncing is turned off. Then, follow the steps below to remove images from the iCloud only:
Open iCloud. com in any browser and sign in with your Apple ID and authenticate your identity. Select Photos. Press the Ctrl (Windows) or Command (macOS) key on your keyboard and select the photos you want to delete. Select the trash can icon at the top-right of the page to delete the photos. The photos will be deleted from iCloud. With iCloud Photos turned off on your device, the photos in the iPhone’s Photo library will not be affected.
How to See if Syncing is Turned On or Off on iPhone
Syncing must be off to ensure photos deleted from iCloud aren’t removed from your iPhone as well. To check whether or not iCloud Photo syncing is enabled on your iPhone, follow these steps:
Open Settings from your iPhone home screen and tap the Apple ID with your name. Select iCloud > Photos. Use the toggle switch for iCloud Photos to enable or disable syncing. To delete photos from iCloud without deleting them from the iPhone turn off the syncing by toggling the switch to off.
Now, you can delete photos from iCloud without removing it automatically from the iPhone. Follow the same steps to turn off iCloud syncing for any other Apple device.
Understanding the ‘Optimize iPhone Storage’ Setting
If Optimize iPhone Storage is enabled, all your full-resolution photos and videos are kept on iCloud and only the latest photos and videos are on the iPhone. When the iPhone is low on storage, the iPhone will upload the full-resolutions images (and videos) to iCloud and replace them with smaller-sized versions on your iPhone
If you delete anything from iCloud Photos, ensure you have the Download and Keep Originals option selected. Now, your entire photo library will remain on your phone (if there is enough free storage) even when you turn off iCloud Photos and start deleting photos from the cloud.
