Google Photos Finally Lets Users Migrate Directly to iCloud Photos ⇥ dtinit.org

Chris Riley, of the Data Transfer Initiative:

Beginning today, Apple and Google are expanding on their direct data transfer offerings to allow users of Google Photos to transfer their collections directly to iCloud Photos. This complements and completes the existing transfers that were first made possible from iCloud Photos to Google Photos and fulfills a core Data Transfer Initiative (DTI) principle of reciprocity. The offering from Apple and Google will be rolling out over the next week and is the newest tool powered by the open source Data Transfer Project (DTP) technology stack, joining existing direct portability tools available to billions of people today offered by DTI and its founding partners Apple, Google, and Meta.

The Data Transfer Initiative’s story originates with Google’s Data Liberation Front, spurred by E.U. legislation. While Google has long permitted users’ retrieval of data it holds, it has not been the most enthusiastic supporter of direct transfers away from its services. This distinction becomes increasingly important as users store more data with cloud-based services instead of keeping local copies — they may not have space to download all their pictures if they trust the cloud provider’s hosting.

Since 2021, iCloud users have been able to migrate images directly to Google Photos. At long last, the same is possible in reverse.