Hi everyone! I’m considering leaving Gmail and switching entirely to iCloud Mail. I’m fully integrated into the Apple ecosystem, so the idea of a more seamless experience is appealing. Plus, I’m interested in the potential privacy benefits compared to Google.

Has anyone here made this switch? How has your experience been with iCloud Mail in terms of reliability, spam filtering, and overall email management compared to Gmail?

Would love to hear your thoughts!

Hello! For a few years now I have been trying to sync my two apple accounts a gmail and another. I have been paying a subscription for years now and finally put an end to it. Was able to download all the photos and upload them to my primary account and I am on my documents. NOW this is where it's hurting.

I have a TON of folders within folders. An example would be:
(Folder) Documents - Inside that folder there are 5 folders - inside those 5 folders there are more 10 more in ea and it keeps going with some.

I cannot download a folder for some reason, therefore my solution as of now has been to go inside each folder and download the file. Create a Folder on Dock drag the file inside the correct folder and put that folder inside the folder that should be on. THIS IS NOT SUSTAINABLE FOR MY SANITY WITH 600+ Folders.

It never ends... I contacted Apple and they were as helpful as always meaning anything to cancel subscription is no help at all.

Therefore if anyone knows a workaround would greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Isn’t it just text??

Does anybody have any way of getting me access to my old iCloud account? I have a ton of super important family photos that I’d like to recover. It’s linked to my old phone number (which I have) but that number is no longer used by anyone so I’m not able to reach out and simply ask them to give me a code (I’ve tried). It’s also linked to my old Microsoft that has also locked me out SMH. I’ve tried the Microsoft recovery feature a million times over the past couple of months but to no success!! I’m growing incredibly frustrated as the days go on as I had this iCloud account from 6th grade all the way through graduating high school and now all of it is lost. If anybody is willing to help it would be much appreciated! I’m desperate! Thank you!

So, I have an old iPhone I found and I know it’s been wiped (factory reset). My current iPhone is logged into my iCloud with a most recent back up. I have an iCloud back up from the old phone that I’d like to access and things i know that won’t be on the most updated backup. If I log into the same iCloud account but use the older back up on it what will happen? Will my current iPhone have the old back up used or can I have two iPhones on the same account with different iCloud back ups???

I'm hoping someone can help me figure this out. A very important document has disappeared.

I'm using MSWord on Mac (Sequoia 15.2). I saved the document in a folder on iCloud (yes, I definitely saved it just before closing). This was a document that has been there for a while that I was editing.

It is not listed with "recent" docs in Word. It is not in the trash. I opened terminal and looked in temporary files. I searched in Spotlight. I checked recent documents on iCloud.com. It is just like it never existed.

Is there anything else I can do?

as seen in this Screenshot i just got a Windows notification from iCloud Drive which says my icloud storage is full and it cant upload more files even know there are still almost 1TB free space. (btw i dont family share my storage or anything)

is this a bug or what exactly is going on?

Anyone know how to fix? :(

Hello I was recently deleted pictures because of no storage and as I was going to where I left off I noticed more than half of my pictures are deleted. That I did not delete can someone help I already updated my phone to latest software. I did not have any other storage backup nor did I delete held of my photo album.

Hi. I'm new to subscribing to bluntly 200 GB iCloud space. Right now, I am currently syncing my photos to the iCloud from my current phone. When I purchase my new iPhone and DONT want to sync the photos on the new phone because it's roughly 143 GB, where will those photos live? Just in the iCloud? Where can I access them if I wanted to look back at the photos. And if I ever want to download my new phones photos to the iCloud to then later delete off the phone storage to create room, will it try to sync all 143gb of photos in my iCloud onto my new iPhone? Hopefully this makes sense lol

iCloud kept pestering me about my full storage, so I just decided I'd stop syncing my desktop to iCloud. I'm responsible when it comes to the physical condition of my laptop and I was comfortable about my files being stored locally on its hard drive. I deselect Desktop & Documents Folders in iCloud in System Preferences, and then all my folders disappear. I get freaked out, so I re-select it and they come back.

A day later, I go into one of the folders to find it completely empty. Then I look at all my other folders and realize that all my files from 2024 and 2025 are GONE. I talked to apple support and they were like "oh go to your Desktop folder in Finder" and "go to your desktop folder in the icloud app" but NO—the FOLDERS are there but they're still empty! Has anyone had this problem before? Holy fucking shit I hate apple so much now. I dragged these files onto my desktop! I thought they were physically stored on my computer! It didnt warn me that it was going to delete an entire year's worth of data when I wanted to stop syncing with stupid icloud! This stupid "syncing" shit is how they lost all my baby photos with my parents. They shouldnt be allowed to call it a back up when it's not a back up.

I am getting a new phone and I need to back up my iphone. I have deleted every app (besides yt) except the original apps, and photo. For backup i apparently need 8.14+ gb but I dont know how that’s possible given i rlly only have stuff in whatsapp and notes. The main problem is the photo section where it says 5.35 gb. I am confused because I paused syncing, and deleted everything i dont need (includes recently deleted folder). Pls help

Is there any way to get one account if I have no Apple device?
Is is possible that my friend who has an iPhone could create it for me?

I received the phone as a gift from an elderly relative who brought it from another country. The phone is signed into their iCloud account, and they don't remember the password, preventing me from signing out from their ID and use my Apple ID. Is there a way to sign out of the account? The device doesn't have a screen lock pin or require a password to download apps from the App Store, it's only needed when trying to sign out or remove the device from Find My. If you have any advice on how to resolve this issue, please let me know. I've already replaced the battery and invested in the device, which has been off for 3-4 years until today.

Hii When I enter iCloud storage I see 2.5GB backup of WhatsApp Messenger. And then under backups I see WhatsApp agian, with 9.9 GB size backup. Is that same backup twice? Why the difference between the sizes? What’s better backup and how to turn off the second?

I need to provide a new number to all my contacts and have settled on sending a new contact card to them (with my new number). Hopefully, they will use the new card to overwrite their contact for me. However, if I do this, will old conversations be referenced with my old number only (with no name)? Or will old conversations simply be "integrated" new conversations using my new number?

How do i share my apple tv subscription with a person whos not in my icloud family?

Is this possible?

Hi all, I don't generally use Apple products, so I'm a bit unsure about how to go about this.

I've got an ipad my child uses and I would like to download or export all of the media to create a backup on my NAS.

I've noticed that an image download creates both a .jpg and a .mov file in the download folder.

Every other device I have ever downloaded a moving image from creates a single .jpg file which includes the moving image data. Why does Apple pull these apart for the download?

How can I preserve a single file, I just wanted a backup of the media with any Apple proprietary weird stuff.

Any help would be appreciated.

I currently am subscribed to iCloud with the 200gb option. I have over 100gb of photos/videos on there right now. I previously had the XR with only 64 gb of storage but today I got the 15 and have 256 of storage. So I have more than enough room for my photos on this device but I’m not sure how to safely downgrade my iCloud subscription. If I downgrade do my photos automatically download to my phone or do I need to do that manually before downgrading? And is everything like my passwords, messages, and stuff on my phone saved? It’s only in the cloud as backup right? I don’t 100% understand how the storage works. Everything should remain on my phone, the iCloud simply syncs it to any other devices, right? Aside from my phones backup and photos/videos, everything else combined seems to be under 5gb so it should be covered with the free plan. TIA

Hello everyone. I got my first MacBook and since it only has 512 GB and I'm editing pictures and short films for instagram etc. I'm wondering if I should activate the icloud photo option. Like instead of using airdrop all the time and hoard double data for possible (re)use on my MacBook.

I want to keep the originals on my iPhone (because I'm afraid of data loss and chaos in the cloud). I think I should be able to copy pictures/videos from the finder (iCloud-folder) direcly on my desktop? Or at least from the photo-app?

When I had only the free 5 GB version there was pure mayham in the cloud, it was totally unsyncronized (due to bigger storage on my phone) and I had to compare and delete hundreds of media myself. I thought I'd never want to do this again...

So I now read that I should a) keep the original-on-phone-option active and b) not have more storage taken on my phone than on the cloud (got now 128 GB phone, 200 GB icloud) so it always can synchronize.

Will this work? I'm so unsure because of my bad experience a few years ago and bad understanding of the iCloud, as you noticed... But now that I have the MacBook I think it'd be a good idea to use the cloud. It seems convenient. Sorry if that's a dumb question, but I need real peoples experience here, if that makes sense :)

See this link for my original post. I think it makes more sense to ask iCloud experts for solutions. I don't see any other posts on this sub with the same question.

This seems to be a widespread issue on all cruises, but happens at random. The free wifi on most ships includes iMessage, but no other internet connection (sort of like airplane wifi, but for days at a time instead of a few hours). Thus, after a few days, sometimes iCloud freaks out and logs out of my iPhone.

The only fix I know of is to pay for full wifi (hundreds of dollars depending on the cruise) and sign back in to iCloud. I really don't want to do that. And the worst part is, i COMPLETELY lost all messages sent to me during that time - when i got home and logged back in, they did not show up. I cant warn my entire contact list that I will be out of town, that's not practical or safe.

How can I prevent iCloud from signing out? On my last cruise, I was the only one affected, the rest of my party had no issues. And I've been on cruises before where it doesn't happen at all. It seems to be quite random.

Would it help to keep my Mac plugged in & connected at home so that iCloud sees a connection? Or is it device-specific? Any thoughts on why the sign-out is happening, and potential fixes that don't include paying for full wifi or using a different messaging service (WhatsApp, etc) are welcome!

Good morning

How to recover messages (old)?? I checked “backup without time limit” on my respective iPhones but I can’t restore, any ideas?

My apple one subscription is linked to credit card and card is always use to pay I have apple balance in my account. Can I use balance to pay for subscription?

Hey everyone! I finally bought storage to back up my phone incase something happened but all of a sudden some of my folders in my iCloud Drive starting to become empty with the files inside them disappearing (I didn’t delete them and recently deleted is empty). They were fine before as I know I had checked my iCloud Drive. Is there any solution to this?

I have never used the icloud. I know in the settings it says I have 5gb for free. My computer won’t let me back up my phone anymore so I’m guessing I need the cloud now. My question is - if my phone says it can hold 128gb and it’s full, then do I need to buy 128gb from the cloud?

After clicking "approve" under password and keychain on the iCloud app, and filling the code, nothing happens.

I have gone back and forth between iphone and android a few times. before i moved to android a couple years ago, i deleted my whole photo library. about a month ago, I moved back to iphone again. today, one month after that, my photo library suddenly brought back all the photos i thought i made sure were deleted. this includes albums, even the hidden one. ???????? i’m confused. how do i make sure that when i delete photos they’re actually gone?

I have 2623 items in iCloud. iCloud only has a 1000 download limit and they're placed in zip folders when downloading them. After I extracted all the zip folders, the total amount was 3,876? That's *way* more than what iCloud showed! There don't appear to be any duplicates so I'm not sure what's going on.

Can anyone explain to me what's going on?