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Can I delete photos from my phone after uploading them without deleting them from Dropbox too?

Here's the essence of the problem: I have DropBox Pro installed on an iPhone 5s, iPad Air, MacBook Pro and Windows desktop computer. I do NOT want to clog up my iPhone, iPad and MacBook with files from DropBox. I want to simply upload and then delete them from the mobile devices. I'd like to use automatic Camera Upload but when I delete the photos from my iPhone or iPad I do NOT want them deleted from DropBox...as has happened on numerous occasions (most recently when I exchanged a broken iPhone for a new one and then tried to copy content from one to the other and subsequently delete unwanted photos...on the iPhone, not "unwanted" from my DropBox space). So how do I do a one way sync? Keep in mind that after photos appear in the Camera Upload folder, I MOVE them to a different desired location...and when they're deleted from my iPhone, they are still deleted from the new location!

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Jane

Hey @Ethan11,

Welcome on the Dropbox Community!

You may keep in mind that, should you use the Camera Uploads functionality to upload your videos, the originals remain on your phone gallery intact, so you'll have to manually remove your videos locally from your phone to free up some space.

I hope this helps you clarify the matter! If you need additional details or assistance, please keep me updated in your reply, I'd be glad to follow-up!

Warm regards,

Jane

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Mariedb

Hi there!

Just to be clear - once the photos are fully uploaded to Dropbox from the Camera Uploads feature, you will be able to delete them from your phone and they will still be in your Dropbox account.

To do this, you can do a test: manually upload one photo to your Dropbox and then delete it from your phone once it is uploaded:

1) Navigate to the location within your Dropbox where you'd like to upload files

2) Select the ellipsis button (...)

3) Tap the "Add Files" button to select the files to upload. There is also an option to create a new folder.

Once it is uploaded and you can see that photo in its location and in the "photos" tab, you can delete it from your phone and you will see that it is not deleted from the Dropbox app.

If you would like to upload all your photos to Dropbox, you can enable Camera Uploads.

he Camera Upload feature is not enabled by default, however you can change the settings for Camera Upload right from the Dropbox app on your iOS device.

Open the Dropbox app, and select Settings
Under the Settings heading, select Camera Upload
You can enable or disable the automatic Camera Upload feature, as well as the option to allow Camera Upload to use cellular data or not. Please note that videos will not be automatically uploaded over cellular data.

I hope this helps!

Rudy Z.

That doesn't work.

Mariedb

Hi there,

Could you tell me what does not work, what steps you are following and where you get unexpected behavior from the app?

If you would like a member of the support team to have a closer look at this, you can get in touch here:

www.dropbox.com/support

Thanks!

Lamar D.

This works perfectly.

I was able to clear MANY gigs of space off of my iPad, iPhone, and my MacBook Pro Retina using this feature within the Dropbox App on all devices. After I kept them all opened and made sure all syncs were finished, I deleted an unwanted pic from my camera roll. This kept the pic on my dropbox while it was removed from every device I had it located on. The program worked flawlessly. I then deleted every pic from my devices as I only wanted access to them online since my Macbook or iPhone is almost always with me. Now, I'm completely untethered from my local internal and external storage. Perfect solution for the supply and demand I was needing so desperately.

Dwyllis M.

this doesn't work for me. if I delete photos from my samsung smartphone then they immediately get deleted from the dropbox folder on my pc. I'd like to be able to free up space on my smartphone but keep the photos in Dropbox folder on other devices

Phil G.8

I think what is being asked is:

Upload Back up images/movies from iPhone or Android to DropBox Cloud
Remove all copies from both iPhone picture app and from the DropBox app on the phone.
Still have Photos and Movies on DropBox cloud (and possibly any laptop or desktop machine that is syncing to the overall folder.)

Right now with Dropbox Camera Upload turned on:

Photo is taken and stored in photo library
Photo is uploaded to Dropbox but also stored locally in Dropbox app

Thus If you take a 100 MB movie, you end up using 200MB of space on the iPhone, 100MB for the Photo Gallery, and 100MB in the Dropbox App.

Of course, you can then manually delete the 100MB movie from the Photo folder, but that's tedious and we're still left with 100MB used in the DropBox app. If deleted from the DropBox app later by accident, it also removes it from all synced folders. That is ~not~ a backup in my opinion but simply a mirror.

What I think the original poster is asking is: "How to I back up Photos and Videos to Drop Box Cloud, but NOT KEEP ANY local version on the mobile device."

Rich

Thus If you take a 100 MB movie, you end up using 200MB of space on the iPhone, 100MB for the Photo Gallery, and 100MB in the Dropbox App.

Not true. The Dropbox app on mobile devices does not store files like the regular computer clients do. Yes, it may have a copy of the files for a short time, but this is just a cache. The only files stored permanently on mobile devices are those marked as available offline. Otherwise any files stored locally by the Dropbox app are periodically deleted automatically.

If deleted from the DropBox app later by accident, it also removes it from all synced folders.

The mobile apps show you a list of what is in your entire account; not what is on the device. Delete a file within the app and you're deleting it from your account, everywhere.

Deleting the photo from your Photo Gallery (after it has been uploaded of course) will not delete the copy that was uploaded to Dropbox. The Carousel app (discontinued) had a nice feature that would purge any photos from the gallery that had already been uploaded to Dropbox. It's likely that will be incorporated into the Dropbox client at some point.

Phil G.8

Thank you for the clarification Richard. I appreciate it.

I just switched on Camera Upload the other day. Prior to that my "Storage Usage" for DropBox app was minimal. (in the 10s of MB)

After the upload (which it did correctly to my Camera Folder), my DropBox app shows 1.1GB of Storage Usage.

Question: How long does it take for the DropBox app to remove them from the iPhone?

If I click on a particular image in DropBox from the Photos tab and then select "..." for its settings I see that is say "Make Available for Offline" which can be toggled to "Remove From Device". Which is the correct setting to remove them my device?

All the recently added images seem to be set to "Make Available for Offline". Do I need to manually change them all to "Remove From Device"?

Is there a way to set the default to "Remove From Device" if that is the setting I'm looking for? I don't seen any obvious way to select all the images and set this globally.

Current Setting on all images and movies in Dropbox - "Photos"

Thank you for your help.

Elizabeth R.22

Hi I am new to Dropbox & I have downloaded all my photos into my Dropbox on my PC & now I am wanting to delete the photos off my iPhone & iPad what I want to know is will I lose them from my Dropbox on my PC if I delete them off my mobile devices please help

J L.17

I agree with Richard G and am very frustrated!! My new phone now has no storage left-- even when I delete the Dropbox app. I have thousands of files I have to manually delete, or else completely reset my phone. Are these my only options other than clicking each single file?

Rod W.5

Check out this video I made. It should give you some understanding of how to make backups rather then mirrored files and storage.

This will help save space on your hard drive but will also allow you to access the files later on DropBox's website.

This video is for PC & will have a link in description for mobile devices show how to set up and save your files.

Best is by date's I'd say. You'll be able to create a folder with the date {Mar-30-16} put files in that folder than deselect the sync to device to remove the files from the DropBox app of the device. Now checking they are on DropBox you can delete them from the device and still have a backup on DropBox

Again saving the valueble space you want on your phone. Its hard but that's how I know to do it. Let me know if you need help and I will try to help. Enjoy and hope I did help some of you out in understanding DropBox for backup rather than mirrored files on a device.

https://youtu.be/IoptLQleVRA Video here how to.

Leonie S.1

I installed dropbox on my device just over a year ago, never really used it, however on the day that we decided to use is to share folders etc, I noticed that my pictures are there - that same day my phone got stolen - now that I accessed my dropbox again and looked more into detail, I discovered that the photo folders (created on my device) is not in dropbox? Is there a different way to upload the photo folders. I only created the folders 2 weeks before - is there still a way to recover the photos? Really hope for some positive feedback - thank you

Kelly H.23

This dropbox app is killing me. I bought it to back up my pictures and videos. It is using up all 128 gigs of my memory! I didn't see any solutions to the original question and it appears there are no settings on dropbox website or in app to offload these pics from my phone to free up space and store them in the cloud, which it sounds like is what everyone is trying to do. Wake up dropbox! give us a solution that works without complication.

Rod W.5

Hi Kelly, technically to upload to Dropbox and backup to the cloud without it being automatic sync is to create a folder for the files that you want to back up and then manually add the files there that's the option that is given. What you do then is unselect in settings not to synchronize that folder. It's recommended that you use a date for the folder dealing with photos that way you can know the time period of your photos and get back to them so yes you can technically back up and then clear your phone and your files will still be on Dropbox. Let me know if this helps you out or if you understood it thank you

Rod Warrix

Rod W.5

Here's a way to do this - go to my files select all files click the share button select Dropbox It'll ask to add to which folder I believe you can create a new folder when that's done click the add button you'll have to do this for images videos and any other files that she just wants a backup I recommend doing this over Wi-Fi and make sure the setting is set to only on Wi-Fi for upload then it's All About Time for a hundred and twenty eight gigs that's going to take a little bit of time I've done 20 gigs overnight before on super high-speed internet but if you have it set to Wi-Fi only then you might be in luck and a pickup every time you're connected to Wi-Fi to upload files until they're uploaded.

Rod Warrix

www.rtwmerchants.com

Berrett M.

Need the feature to purge backed up files that was in carousel.

Kay O.2

There appears to not be a system to handle this problem within Dropbox! Now, where to look for an app for this problem?

I wish there were a place I could go to find succinct help?

martin h.

No one answered the question about how to delete from dropbox on a macbook pro while still having the images on the cloud. Is this possible? can i just delete the images in the camera uploads folder on my macbook and they will still be on the cloud? Is this folder acting differently than other folders on the dropbox platform?

Jonathan B.3

Here's the process I've used that seems to work: move (not delete) the files from the Camera Uploads folder (on Win or Mac) to another folder. I move the files to folders named by date, such as 2016\01_January, 2016\02_February, 2016\03_March, and so on).

Once moved (not copied or deleted) from the Camera Uploads folder, Dropbox does not upload again (because they've already been synced from your mobile device (phone/tablet) to Camera Uploads. Once I've moved the files to another folder, I can delete the images from my mobile device.

Now here's the caveat! I have a windows PC with lots of storage. I also use a MacBook Pro with less storage plus an iPhone and iPad. I take photos on all devices (except the PC) and don't want to clutter up my phone, tablet or MacBook with excess photos. BUT Dropbox must be able to sync somewhere and for me that somewhere is my desktop PC. So when I move files to my PC, they are still synced with Dropbox and I can delete off the other devices. I do selective sync with the other devices (most important on the MacBook because otherwise it wants to sync all Dropbox files on its limited storage).

The same approach could be done using an external drive on your Macbook. Dropbox would upload files automatically to your Camera Uploads folder, you'd then move them to the external drive and free up space on the (probably) more limited MacBook storage. Make sense?

Craig L.8

Yikes, sure we can manually move photos and video files out of the automatic photo uploads folder up on Dropbox.com and.or out on a connected computer, and then manually delete them from the phone.. But shouldn't the computer(s) just do it for us? Seriously, this is a perfect example of just the kind of simple repetitive task suited to automation. I guess I'll go engage with Dropbox support. Perhaps there's a fix for this already. (.. as well as for the RAW file auto export problem.)

Thanks for the helpful procedurals though. They do clarify the synching relationships.

Jim M.58

The problem with the proposed solution of moving them to an unsynchronized folder is that sometimes I might want to access them on the mobile device. If the folder is unsynchronized then - correct me if I'm wrong - I won't be able to download the individual file, without first resyncing the folder, and then waiting while dropbox downloads every file in that folder. When all I wanted was that one file. I don't have time to wait for dropbox to download the entire folder. I want dropbox to store a list of the files in the folder, and let me choose to download some of them when I need them.

Louis-Martin R.

We REALLY need the old carrousel feature ... Do you know of Google or Microsoft have a solution that can do this ? I've always been loyal to DB, but without this it doesn't make sens as picture syncing tool...

Peter W.52

I have deleted the Dropbox App from my mobile devices. I log onto Dropbox using Google Chrome then download the small number of files I need onto my mobile device. This avoids syncing the entire Dropbox account.

Roberta D.4

I have an iPhone 6 and want to move my pictures from my iphone to my hp pavilion sleekbook PC to free up space on my iphone. What is the easiest way to do this? I already have it set up to auto transfer pics weekly from iPhone to PC but want to be able to (comfortably)delete off iPhone with the knowledge they won't be lost if I delete off

iPhone.

Sairey G.

I want to organize the photos I take and have them available, in grid form, on both my iphone and computer. As far as I can tell, Dropbox only offers a list form. I like seeing them as my iphone Photos displays them - bigger, in a grid. Does anyone know a solution? Ideally I want to sync and organize them to dropbox and then as I do that they are deleted from the photos app on my phone. I want to be able to find them in their folders, and not duplicated in other places.

Thanks!

It seems Dropbox used to have something called Carousel. Will they be coming out with something soon? Thank you!

Natalie R.

I am no longer wanting to use Dropbox. I want to take all photos and videos from my "camera uploads" section and move them to an external hard drive. Aside from selecting each individual file I cannot figure out an expeditious way to do this. With over 3k photos, that option is just not realistic.

Can anyone help me with this query?? My question posed to Dropbox help desk only referred me to a very unhelpful link to a site that just shows me how to copy and paste files on my computer, which I am already well aware of how to do.

Thank you for any feedback you can provide!

Rod W.5

Ask Dropbox if the offered paid backup media like putting your files on DVD's than have them mail them to you. Old day's prices varied on different services from one free processing a year but you give them the money for the DVD's to $59.99 plus the cost of DVD's they would say it took to backup your files on and postage to mail them to you.

One service had a mailed encryped hard drive they'd put your files on and mail it to you then you mail it back and you paid shipping and low cost once a year service use but not sure if DropBox is able to do this.

Just thought I'd offer a suggestion even thou you said you already contacted them and they did not help out but send you a link to backup your files over the internet.

Here just in case others would like to get an Idea of

"Cloud Storage Is Not Cloud Backup"

If you looking for true backup and restore services Google search them. Some as I said will mail a large hard drive to you either with your files on it or for you to put files on it to send back to the company to load into your files online without uploading or downloading them. Hope this make's since to people! Sorry if I cause any confusion with this post. I have been though the samething and don't like it at all! Even with DropBox! If I find more information I'll post back here at sometime. Thanks for reading. Hope all goes well and everyone gets what they want!

Jonathan B.3

Natalie R., unless I'm misreading your question, the answer is as simple as copying all the files in your Camera Uploads folder to a connected external drive on your computer (Mac or Windows). In other words, all those files in the Camera Uploads folder are already (or should be) automatically synced with the \Documents\My Dropbox\Camera Uploads\ folder on your computer's hard drive. Simply navigate to that folder, select all files (Ctrl-A or Command-A on Mac), copy them (Ctrl-C or Command-C) and navigate to the external hard-drive location where you want to copy the files and paste them in that location (Ctrl-V or Command-V).

bdr2

Yes! That's what we need!

mccoyLBI

Why can't you guys just add a feature to delete all photos that were just uploaded? It's really not that hard...