This is Why I Don’t Use iCloud
Tired of getting the “Your iCloud storage is almost full” notification? Me too.
If you have an iPhone, you are likely familiar with the single most annoying notification that exists, “Your iCloud storage is almost full.” It is a marketing ploy Apple uses to get you to upgrade your service as if you hadn’t already paid $1,000 dollars for the phone itself. As you probably do too, I dismiss the notification out of habit now, without any consideration for what it offers. However, over the past couple years I’ve been managing my cloud storage much more efficiently, and I seldom see that satanic notification.
Managing Space in iCloud
First thing’s first, go into Settings on your iPhone and click your Apple ID at the top > iCloud. You will see how your storage is being used at the top of the page followed by a list with every app that is being backed up with iCloud.
Just because you switch one of the buttons to the “off” position on this page does not mean you lose your data for that app. Your data will still be on your phone, you just can’t access it from another device.
So, let’s turn off every app that you don’t need on your other Apple devices. For me, the biggest users of cloud storage that I seldom use on other Apple devices include:
1. Photos — I use OneDrive to store my photos so I can access them anywhere, even if it’s not on an Apple device.
2. Mail — Gmail has all of my emails already backed up and so if I log in to my email on any device it will download my emails directly from Gmail
3. iCloud Backup — I took this off because I am not getting a new phone soon where I will want the same exact phone set-up as my current one.
If you don’t have another Apple device, then you can unselect everything! You are essentially telling your phone to keep all of your data saved on your phone instead of the cloud. If you plan on getting an Apple device at some point in the future, you can easily switch the apps back to “on” to have in iCloud.
Note: This is also customizable! Let’s say you don’t have any other cloud or hard drive backing up your photos, by all means, leave the photos option in iCloud on.
My Solution
Don’t get me wrong, iCloud can be useful. The purpose of iCloud is so you can access your data across all of your Apple devices. However, a large portion of people either don’t have another Apple device, or don’t need to be storing that much data in the cloud. If you do have exclusively Apple devices and will for the foreseeable future, it may be harder to implement what I am talking about in this article.
If you don’t have exclusively Apple devices, then you may know that iCloud only works with Apple. So, sometimes it can be frustrating not being able to have your photos and files on every device at any time.
The solution is OneDrive.
OneDrive is Microsoft’s cloud and can be used on any phone and any computer. It even integrates into your computer for a seamless experience, without having to deal with managing space on your browser (although you can if you want).
The best way to use it is to buy the 100 GB for $1.99 a month and store everything, and I do mean everything, on it. You can access your photos and files from a OneDrive folder in Finder or File Explorer, and they automatically upload to the cloud once you add something to it.
100 GB is a lot of space. I keep all of my photos, journals, school and personal projects from the last 3 years on OneDrive and I have only used about 25% of its capacity. $1.99 a month may not seem worth it at the moment, but I guarantee you a couple of years down the line you will thank me.
Conclusion
iCloud is hard to utilize in a way that you are maximizing its potential. Apple tries to put far more data in the cloud than you need, resulting in notifications that prompt you to upgrade your storage plan.
All it takes to be smarter about your iCloud storage is thinking about what you want on your other Apple devices. Look in your iCloud settings and determine for yourself if you truly need something in the cloud or not. Remember, even if you turn one-off, the data does not disappear. It is still saved on your phone’s local storage.
If you are tired of getting annoying notifications like I was, do a little research! There are a lot of solutions out there, just like OneDrive. Once you figure out a solution that’s right for you, you will be amazed at the peace of mind it brings you.
