(27 votes, average: 3.67 out of 5)If you are trying to understand how to get pictures from iCloud to your iPhone, you probably noticed that when it comes to iCloud is not that easy. Thankfully, there’s are 4 working solutions to download photos from iCloud to your iPhone you can choose from:
- Download photos from iCloud to iPhone
- Get photos from iCloud backup to PC or iPhone
- Restore photos from iCloud backup to iPhone
- Get photos from iCloud to be stored on iPhone
The following methods work both for iPhones and iPads. Let’s start transferring photos from iCloud to iPhone!
How to download photos from iCloud to iPhone
The following method is very direct – you download photos from iCloud to a computer and add them to your iPhone. In addition, you can conveniently manage the photos you want to transfer to your iPhone.
The best thing is that this method doesn’t require overwriting your data – you just add photos to your phone. Period.
- First, let’s download photos from iCloud to a computer. For that, please install CopyTrans Cloudly:
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Run CopyTrans Cloudly. You will see a login screen. Enter your Apple ID and password.
NOTE: We use secure SSL-connection and do not store your account data, unless you want us to save it for faster log in.
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If you have two-factor authentication enabled, make sure to allow the connection on your device:
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Wait until your iCloud Photo Library is loaded. To download all photos from iCloud, click Download and select the folder where you want to download your library to:
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Voila! All you need to do now is wait until all your photos and videos from iCloud are downloaded.
- We are ready to download these iCloud photos to iPhone! For an easy transfer, please use CopyTrans Photo:
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Start CopyTrans Photo and connect your device. iPhone photos are displayed on the left while the PC photos appear on the right.
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From the far right pane, select a PC folder where you have saved your iCloud photos. Then select the exact photos you wish to transfer to the iPhone.
TIP: To select multiple photos, press and hold the CTRL key and click on the individual photos. To select all iCloud photos, press CTRL + A.
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Next, choose the iPhone album on the left to add photos from computer.
Due to Apple limitations, you cannot add photos to the albums that were created on the iPhone. Please, create a new album to download iCloud photos to iPhone.
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To put the pictures from computer to iPhone, just drag and drop the selection anywhere within the iPhone photo pane – basically from right to left.
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Finally, click on the “Apply changes” button to confirm transferring iCloud photos to iPhone.
And that’s it! You have successfully moved photos from iCloud to iPhone in a matter of minutes!
Get photos from iCloud backup
If the iCloud Photos feature was disabled on your device and the photos were not in iCloud – do not lose heart. It means that they would be included into an iCloud backup if you made one recently. You can discover and look inside your iCloud backups with CopyTrans Backup Extractor. Here’s how:
- Download and install CopyTrans Backup Extractor:
- Install and run the program. If you need help, refer to the installation guide.
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On the welcome screen, choose “Log in to iCloud for more backups”.
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Enter your Apple ID and password.
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If you have 2-factor authentication enabled, you will also need to insert a verification code sent to your device.
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There you are! after a short search CopyTrans Backup Extractor will display all your backups, both on PC and in iCloud. iCloud backups are marked with a cloud icon, while PC backups have a folder icon next to them.
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Choose the backup that contains your photos. If the backup is encrypted, enter the backup password to proceed.
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Click on “Photos”.
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Finally, select the folder you want to extract the photos to and wait for the process to complete. Voila! You can now click on “Open containing folder” to see all of the extracted photos.
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Your photos are successfully out of the backup! You can now transfer them to your PC.
Download CopyTrans Backup Extractor
Restore photos from iCloud to iPhone
If your photos are not in iCloud (they weren’t synced), don’t worry – it means they would be included into an iCloud backup. You can now restore photos directly to your iPhone using iCloud restore. The drawbacks are that you won’t be able to restore iCloud photos only and you will need to erase all content from the iPhone first. If you would like a more “democratic” way of restoring your photos, use CopyTrans Backup Extractor – it will find your iCloud backups and extract them to your PC, after which you can easily import them to iPhone. If you wish to proceed with erase and restore, follow the steps below:
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First of all, let’s make sure that you have a valid iCloud backup. Open “Settings” on your iPhone and tap on your name -> iCloud -> Manage Storage -> Backups.
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To restore photos to iPhone from iCloud backup go back to the “Settings” and choose “General”. Scroll down and find the “Reset” tab.
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Here you need to choose “Erase All Content and Settings”, then “Erase now”.
TIP: If you are not comfortable with erasing your data, try a direct method.
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After the reset, your iPhone will reboot and take you through the setup steps. At the step when you get the option to restore your device from an old backup, choose the backup with your iCloud photos.
Get photos from iCloud to be stored on iPhone
One of the most obvious ways of getting iCloud photos to be stored on iPhone is actually hidden in the iPhone Settings. The major drawback of this method is that you have no control over the downloading process and have no estimate when it will be finished. If you don’t mind some waiting time, check the Apple guide or follow the instruction below:
- On your iPhone, go to Settings. Tap on your name -> iCloud.
- Select Photos and then iCloud photos (or iCloud Photo Library for older iOS versions).
Make sure that you have selected the “Download and Keep Originals” option.
- Now, all you have to do is wait until the iCloud photos are downloaded to the iPhone. Make sure that you have a strong Wi-Fi connection. It’s even better to keep it working overnight.
Hope you’ve managed to successfully download photos from iCloud to iPhone with one of these solutions. Let me know which one worked for you in the comments!
