Apple announced on Friday its plans to shut down the My Photo Stream service on July 26th, 2023. This free service, available since the launch of iCloud in 2011, allowed users to upload their images and videos from Apple devices to iCloud for up to 30 days and a maximum of 1,000 files. My Photo Stream was introduced before iCloud Photos as a means for users to access their media across multiple devices. Notably, the content uploaded through My Photo Stream did not contribute to the iCloud storage limit, although they were not saved at full resolution.
According to a support document discovered by MacRumors, Apple stated that starting from June 26th, 2023, My Photo Stream would no longer automatically upload photos to the company's servers. From that point on, the photos and videos would remain on iCloud for 30 days until the official shutdown on July 26th. As the original format and resolution of each image and video were stored on at least one Apple device, no cherished memories would be lost during the shutdown process. However, Apple advised users to save specific images to their device's Photo Library before July 26th if they wanted continued access.
To save an image from My Photo Stream on an iPhone or iPad, users could open the Photos app, navigate to the My Photo Stream album, select the desired photo, and use the Share button to save it to their Library. The support document concluded by emphasizing that iCloud Photos provided the best way to keep photos and videos up to date across devices and securely stored in iCloud.
