While Photos stored on iCloud can be considered as being safe and secure for all practical purposes, it is not uncommon for users to transfer photos from iCloud to an external storage drive.
In general, the most common reason for this is to Free Up iCloud Storage Space and to have an additional backup of photos on a physical storage drive.
Having an additional backup of Photos on an External Hard Drive ensures that you do not lose your precious memories, if something happens to your iCloud Account or you end up losing Photos due to a technical glitch.
Transfer Photos from iCloud to External Hard Drive
It is easy to transfer photos from iCloud to External Hard Drive, whether you want to have another Backup of all your Photos or want to free up the storage space in your iCloud Account.
1. Transfer Selected Photos from iCloud to USB Storage Drive
If you are trying to create a backup of selected photos, you can follow the steps below to Transfer Selected Photos from iCloud to USB Storage Drive.
1. Using your Mac or PC, go to icloud.com.
2. Login to your iCloud Account by entering your Apple ID and Password.
3. After you are Signed-in, click on the Apps Icon (top-right) and then click on the Photos Icon.
4. In iCloud Photos, switch to the Library Tab (left-pane) > select Photos that you want to Transfer and click on the Download Icon.
Note: If you are on Mac, use the Command key to select multiple photos. On Windows PC, you can use the Ctrl key to select multiple photos.
5. On the next window, select the USB Drive in the left-pane and click on the Save button.
All the selected Photos will be downloaded to the USB Drive in Zip Format.
2. Transfer All Photos from iCloud to External Hard Drive
Currently, the download limit for iCloud Photos is 999 photos. Hence, if you have more than 1000 photos, you will have to download them in batches of about 500 photos at a time.
To select 500 Photos on iCloud, click on the First Photo > Scroll down 50 rows > Hold the Shift key and click on the Last Photo in 50th row.
If you have less than 1000 photos, you can follow the steps below to select All iCloud Photos and download them to an External Hard Drive.
1. Using Mac or PC go to icloud.com and login to your iCloud Account.
2. After you are Signed-in, click on the Apps Icon (top-right) and then click on the Photos Icon.
3. In iCloud Photos, switch to Library Tab > select the first photo and then press Command+A to select all Photos. Once, all the Photos are selected, click on the Download Icon.
5. On the next window, select your External Hard Drive in left-pane and click on the Download button in right-pane.
All the selected Photos will be downloaded to the External Hard Drive in a Zip file format.
Note: At the time of this revision, iCloud download limit stands at 999 photos at a time.