Apple is known for their convenient and user-friendly products and services. If you own any Apple devices, you are probably familiar with iCloud Drive, Apple’s cloud storage system, which includes your photos, files, and documents. However, for Windows devices, iCloud Drive requires to be installed and set up manually. In this guide, we will show you how to do just so.
Setting up iCloud for Windows
First and foremost, you would need to download the iCloud for Windows application from the Microsoft Store (requires Windows 10 or later). For devices with earlier versions of Windows, you can download the iCloud for Windows app here. When the setup for the iCloud application is complete, a restart is required to complete the initialisation of the iCloud Application.
Upon restarting, the iCloud application should pop up automatically. If not, manually open the downloaded application. open the application and sign in to your Apple ID.
After logging in, a checklist will pop up where you can choose which iCloud features you would like to sync with your other devices.
Select Apply and iCloud Drive should appear on your File Explorer. Remember you can pin it for easier access!
Syncing Photos on iCloud
With iCloud for Windows installed, you can choose to sync photos from your devices to your Windows PC/Laptop. To do so, you need to first ensure that your photos are uploaded to iCloud from your devices.
On your device, Go to Settings App > Apple ID (click your name) > iCloud > Photos > iCloud Photos. Ensure that the toggle for iCloud Photos is ‘on’ so that your photos can be accessed by your other devices through the iCloud server.
On your PC/Laptop, go to the iCloud for Windows application, selecting Photos will trigger the following pop up will be presented:
Select your preferences and click done. Thereafter, you can start accessing your photos saved onto iCloud!
Personal Experience
For the first few times using iCloud on my computer, I realised a significant lag time of about 5-10 minutes for my documents and photos to sync across other devices. However, after the first few syncs, the lag time significantly decreases and is almost instantaneous, at about 10 seconds. Although the initial setting up of iCloud for Windows may be a little tedious, having it embedded on my file explorer has been very convenient and easy to use. If you use iCloud Drive for your photos or documents but are also using a Windows desktop, downloading it directly to your computer is surely a must. We hope that this post has helped!