Keep the memories. Question the arrangement.
Your childhood should not become difficult to retrieve because someone redesigned a subscription page.
An exit plan begins with a readable copy of your photos, not a dramatic cancellation. This guide is a small export-and-recovery rehearsal. Keep the existing service and originals intact until you know what you have recovered.
Choose a sample that can expose problems
Pick about twenty items you own and can compare: an old picture, a recent phone photo, a video, an edited image, and any special format you actually use. Include a motion photo or RAW file only if it belongs in your real collection. Record which album each item came from and what dates or captions you expect.
Use the photo exit-plan worksheet. Write generic item labels rather than private captions or locations. A picture opening successfully is one check. Keeping its date, edit, and intended quality is several more.
Export; do not substitute a screenshot
Use your provider’s supported download or export route. For Google, Google Takeout guidance explains selecting products and creating an archive. Keep the delivered archive intact before working with an extracted copy. Some additional Google Photos information is exported in companion JSON files; keep those alongside the media until you understand what they contain. A file’s new filesystem date is not necessarily its original capture date.
Apple’s iCloud download instructions distinguish Unmodified Originals from compatibility-oriented downloads. An original and an edited version can serve different needs. Decide whether you want both before treating one as the complete record.
Check the selected export scope. An album download, a product-wide archive, and everything visible on a phone need not contain the same items. Record what you requested and what actually arrived; a familiar thumbnail is not an inventory.
Inspect the files outside the service
- Work in an extracted test folder. Keep the untouched export separately.
- Compare your expected sample against the delivered files. Investigate missing items and duplicates before renaming anything.
- Open photos at full size and play videos, including a section near the end. Check orientation and useful image detail.
- Inspect capture dates and any captions, location information, or edits you care about. Note which information is in sidecars or absent.
- Record the result item by item: present, readable, expected quality, metadata checked, or needs investigation.
File counts alone are weak evidence. A single media item can have a sidecar, an edited version, and related components. Keep the relationships while you learn the export format.
Try a new library with disposable copies
If you want a self-hosted photo library, Immich’s quick start is one option to evaluate on a separate test instance. Use copies of the sample, keep the first trial on your home network, and check the current installation requirements before committing hardware or time.
For an existing folder, Immich’s external-library instructions explain read-only mounts using :ro. Read-only access prevents the application from deleting source media through that mount, but also limits writing sidecar metadata. This is a deliberate tradeoff, not a promise that every other setting is harmless.
Check whether dates, videos, edits, and organization appear as expected in the trial. Do not assume the destination imports every provider’s sidecar format or recreates albums automatically. Record mismatches rather than quietly discarding them.
Prove the backup before making the move
Copy the verified export to separate storage. Restore the sample into a new folder and repeat the opening and metadata checks. If using Immich, follow its backup documentation: database dumps contain metadata, not the photo and video files. A useful recovery plan needs both, with compatible versions and the right external-library paths.
Only consider reducing or closing the old service after you have checked the complete export, preserved independent copies, and rehearsed recovery. The small sample teaches you what to inspect; it does not certify a much larger collection you have not examined.
Next: use the Recovery Drill to practice content verification on disposable files. Owning the storage is the beginning. Being able to recover the memories is the useful part.