Guide

Move Google Photos to iCloud and keep the dates

There are two ways to get a Google Photos library into iCloud Photos. Google's direct transfer is the least work. Downloading with Takeout and fixing the files first gives you more control and a copy you keep. Either way, the goal is the same: every photo on the day it was taken.

Option 1: Google's direct transfer to iCloud Photos

Google Takeout can copy your library straight into iCloud Photos, without downloading anything. Apple documents it in its support article:

1. On your iPhone, iPad or Mac, turn on iCloud Photos and iCloud Drive, and make sure your iCloud storage has room for the library.
2. Go to takeout.google.com, choose to transfer your Google Photos, pick Apple iCloud Photos as the destination and sign in with your Apple Account.
3. Wait. Apple says it takes between several hours and a few days. Don't turn off iCloud Photos meanwhile: that stops the transfer.

What Apple says about the result:

• Photos and videos land in an album called "Import from Google" with the transfer date.
• Each file comes with its metadata, listed as file name, description, file type and location.
• Motion Photos, Live Photos and Memories aren't transferred. RAW files and other types iCloud Photos can't hold go to iCloud Drive.
• It isn't available with Advanced Data Protection turned on, or for child and Managed Apple Accounts.

Look through the import before deleting anything from Google Photos. If photos show up on the transfer day instead of the day they were taken, or you need the files themselves, use option 2.

Option 2: Takeout, fix the files, then import

1. Export with Takeout

1. At takeout.google.com click Deselect all, tick Google Photos, choose to export once as .zip, with the largest file size offered.
2. Download every part when Google's email arrives: takeout-...-001.zip, -002.zip and so on. Keep them together; a photo's JSON can sit in a different part.

2. Put the dates into the files

Takeout keeps the date of many photos (screenshots, saved images, Google Photos edits, many videos) only in a JSON file beside each one, and stamps every file with the export day. iCloud reads the date inside the file, so this step decides whether the timeline comes out right.

• Free, with ExifTool: one command copies the date from each JSON into its photo. See the command and what it misses.
• In the browser, with Takeoutfix: add the zip parts to Takeoutfix in Chrome or Edge. The scan is free; fix 100 photos and videos free, import them and check, then fix the whole library for $9, once. Nothing is uploaded.

3. Import into iCloud Photos

• On a Mac: in Photos, with iCloud Photos turned on in Settings, choose File > Import, select the fixed folder, then Import All. Photos uploads them to iCloud.
• On Windows: install iCloud for Windows, turn on Photos, and add the fixed photos to iCloud Photos in File Explorer. For smaller batches you can also upload at icloud.com/photos.

Keep the fixed folder (and the original zips) until you've scrolled through the library on your iPhone.

What to expect either way

• Albums don't come back as albums from folders. Apple's transfer puts everything in one album; an import from folders creates none. Recreating a few important albums by hand is normal.
• Live Photos come out of Takeout as a photo and a short video. Takeoutfix dates both but can't merge them back into one Live Photo.
• Edits made in Google Photos arrive as separate -edited files. Which to keep.

Related guides

• Moving from Google Photos to Apple Photos with the dates intact
• Apple Photos shows the wrong date after importing a Google Takeout
• Google Takeout photos have the wrong date: why, and how to fix it