Starting June 1, 2021, all new photos and videos backed up in High quality and Express quality* will count toward the free 15 GB of storage that comes with your Google account or any additional storage you may have purchased, the same way other Google services like Google Drive and Gmail already do.
While this isn’t a surprise — Google announced its new policy back in November 2020 — it is still depressing to be reminded of the upcoming storage crunch. Of course, until June 1st, you can still add as many “high quality” photos as you like, so if you’re planning to upload a lot of old photos, this is the time to do it. Meanwhile, though, you may want to figure out just how much space you’re already using, so you can figure out if you need to upgrade. It’s not difficult, and there are several ways of doing it:
Google will let you know how much storage space you have left and what it’s being used by.
Once the June 1st deadline has passed, Google says it will send reminders when you’re nearing your limit. It also intends to provide a tool that will identify what it calls “dark, blurry, and otherwise unwanted content.”
One word of advice: before you do anything else, try to get rid of any old, unwanted, or duplicate files that are hanging around in your Google storage. You’d be amazed at how much space you might save.
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