Changes to Google Storage

If you’ve got a Google account – you use Google Photos, Google Drive (and the Google Docs suite) or Gmail – you’ll probably have received an email telling you about the changes that Google are making to the way it calculates how much of the 15Gb of storage the company allocates to you has been used. They have also spelled out clearly when they will delete content that has been inactive for more than two years.

This post relies heavily (almost verbatim) on information already available on Google’s Help Pages – which should always be taken as the main source for information.

Currently each Google Account includes 15 GB of free storage quota, which is shared across Gmail, Google Drive, and Google Photos. You can add to your storage quota by purchasing a Google One membership (where available). To learn more about your quota, see what items count towards your storage.

Prior to June 1, 2001

The following items count against your storage quota

  • Original quality photos and videos backed up to Google Photos
  • Gmail messages and attachments, including your Spam and Trash folders
  • Most files in Google Drive, including PDFs, images, and videos

If you go over your storage quota

  • You can no longer upload new files or images to Google Drive
  • You can’t back up Original quality photos and videos to Google Photos
  • Your ability to send and receive email in Gmail may be impacted
  • You can still sign into and access your Google Account

After June 1, 2001

The following additional items will count against your storage quota:

  • High quality and Express quality photos and videos backed up to Google Photos after June 1, 2021. Learn more about this change.
  • Files created or edited in collaborative content creation apps like Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms and Jamboard.
    • Only files created or edited after June 1, 2021 will count against your quota.
    • Files uploaded or last edited before June 1, 2021 will not count against your quota.

And this is how your usage impacts your data

If you do not use Gmail, Google Drive (including Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms or Jamboard) or Google Photos for 2 years, your content within the inactive product(s) may be deleted (after reasonable advance notice).

If you go over your storage quota

  • You can’t upload new files or images to Google Drive.
  • You can’t back up any photos and videos to Google Photos.
  • Your ability to send and receive email in Gmail can also be impacted.
  • You can’t create new files in collaborative content creation apps like Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms and Jamboard. And until you reduce your storage usage, neither you nor anyone else can edit or copy your affected files.
  • You can still sign into and access your Google Account.

When you have been over your storage quota for 2 years, your content in Gmail, Google Drive (including Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms and Jamboard files) and Google Photos may be deleted.

So it’s time to do a stock take of what Google Storage you’re using. You’ll see something like this if you’ve got an active Google account …

Seeing how you may be using your Google Storage, with June 1st approaching might seem pretty frightening to you, so you might need some help to know what you should do, and whether purchasing a Google One plan might be right for you …

What happens when you’re over quota

When you’re over quota, it means you’re using more storage space than you have available. If you’ve been over quota for 2 years or longer, and you have not freed up or purchased more space to get back under quota, all of your content may be removed from Gmail, Drive and Photos. But before that happens, we will:

  • Give you notice using email and notifications within the Google products. We will contact you at least three months before content is eligible for deletion.
  • Give you the opportunity to avoid deletion (by paying for additional storage or removing files)
  • Give you the opportunity to download your content from our services. Learn more about how to download your Google data.

How to go back under quota

We provide access to storage management tools that help you identify ways to free up storage space at https://one.google.com/storage. Another option to free up space is to download your files to your personal device and then delete them from your cloud storage.

However …

If you want more storage space for Gmail, Drive, and Photos, you can upgrade to a larger storage plan with Google One.  You can click on the link “Get more storage” from the page that you should have arrived at above, and you’ll be offered the opportunity of purchasing a Google One Storage Plan …

But what happens when you’re inactive?

When you have been inactive in Gmail, Google Drive (including Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms, Jamboard or Sites files) or Google Photos for 2 years, all of your content may be removed from that product. But before that happens, we will:

  • Give you notice using email and notifications within the Google products. We will contact you at least three months before content is eligible for deletion.
  • Give you the opportunity to avoid deletion (by becoming active in the product)
  • Give you the opportunity to download your content from our services. Learn more about how to download your Google data.

If you’re a Google One member with no outstanding payment or quota issues, you are considered active.

Important: As an example, if you’re inactive for 2 years in Photos, but still active in Drive and Gmail, only your Google Photos content will be deleted. Content in Gmail and Google Drive (including Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms and Jamboard files) will not be deleted if you are active in those products.

How to stay active in these products

The simplest way to keep your data active is to periodically visit Gmail, Google Photos, and Google Drive (and/or collaborative content creation apps like Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawings, Forms, Jamboard and Sites) on the web or through a Google app. Make sure you’re signed in and connected to the internet.

Please note that you may have multiple accounts set up on your device. Activity is considered by account, not by device. Make sure you’re using the services for all accounts on which you wish to remain active.

The article from Google concludes with some FAQ which you might like to refer to, including one answer on how to preserve content from a loved one if they pass away and the use of their Inactive Account Manager.

In another article, I will attempt to answer the vexed question of how to delete photos from Google Photos in your storage plan, your computer and your device the way that you want them to be deleted, ie not deleting them all, just deleting them from the place you want them deleted!!!!

Lastly, here’s a link to how to delete files (and reduce the count against your quota) from Google Drive.

Google Photos – some observations

I’m following up my previous post with some notes based on using Google Photos for a couple of days of testing and observation. This will lead into some thoughts on how I will use it, and what I need to do to make sure the Workflow is “right” for me. This might also be relevant to others, especially those using both DSLR and Smartphones, so I’d welcome comments.

The first thing to mention is that My Drive > Google Photos and the separate Google Photos menu item on your Google Drive are not the same! This is reflected in this note which advises you not to use Google Photos Backup (from your Desktop) and the sychronised My Drive > Google Photos  local folder at the same time.

What this means in practice is that if you have a Workflow that involves placing an image in your local Google Photos folder to sync to your My Drive folder on Google Drive for sharing, or for embedding in a blogpost (like the tasteful one above taken during the testing 😆 ), then you probably shouldn’t use the Google Photos Backup application.

What does this mean then? Well a couple of observations.

  1. Google Photos is a good repository for images taken with Smartphones; it’s painless, quick and ensures that if you have auto-sync switched on in either your Google Photos app, or in the Google+ app (for iOS 7, or earlier) that you have a safe and secure home for your images which will have lots of other advantages. read this excellent review by Mike Elgan for further information.
  2. If you’re a DSLR camera user then you have to think carefully whether you want to use the Google Photos Backup application on your desktop.
    1. If you don’t use any other Image Editing software then it might well be a good idea – setting the Image Quality probably to High (so that you don’t use any of your 15Mb of Free Storage) and following the guidance in the note referenced above about excluding your My Drive > Google Photos from your Google Drive synchronisation, if relevant.
    2. If you’re using something like Lightroom to post-process your images then it might be better to use the export options in the software to copy an image (or collection of images) from the software to your My Drive > Google Photos folder to sync up to Google Photos  and then on for sharing from either your desktop, or your mobile device a little later, and not using the Google Photos Backup application.
  3. Luckily none of the decisions you make now are irreversible, but a bit of careful consideration now may mean that you have the “right” workflow for your needs. For me as an iPhoneographer and DSLR camera user I’m happy to let Google Photos now be my Backup and Storage Solution of choice for the iPhone (see 1 above), but because I’m also a Lightroom user I’ll not use the Google Photos Backup application. Moreover, having made this decision it means that I can, if I chose, Import any images taken on the iPhone into Lightroom for post-processing, meaning I don’t clutter Lightroom up with images I don’t really want to keep.

Any thoughts?