photo organizing co

How to download all your Google Photos with Google Takeout

Updated

Google Photos has no single “download everything” button. The way to get your whole library, with every photo and video, is Google Takeout at takeout.google.com. You choose what to export, Google builds the files, and you download them.

It is free and not hard, but a big library takes time and the result is a little messy. This guide covers the steps, what to pick, and the two things that surprise people: the dates and the duplicates.

Before you start

  • Use a computer, not a phone. Google recommends downloading and viewing exports on a desktop.
  • Check how much Google storage you are using at photos.google.com. You need at least that much free space on the computer or drive you download to, and a good deal more is safer, because the files arrive zipped and you need room to unzip them.
  • Allow hours to days. Google says an export can take from a few minutes to a few days.
  • Do not delete anything from Google Photos or your phone until you have downloaded everything and checked it.

The steps

  1. Go to takeout.google.com and sign in to the Google account that holds the photos.
  2. Click Deselect all.
  3. Scroll to Google Photos and tick it.
  4. Under Google Photos there is a button that says All photo albums included. Leave it as it is to get everything. Read the section on albums below before you change it.
  5. Scroll down and click Next step.
  6. Choose how to get the files. Send download link via email is the simplest. You can also send them to Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive or Box.
  7. Choose Export once. (The other option makes a new export every 2 months for a year.)
  8. Choose the file type. .zip opens on almost any computer. .tgz may need extra software on Windows, so pick .zip.
  9. Choose the file size. The choices run from 1 GB up to 50 GB. If your library is bigger than the size you pick, Google makes several files. A smaller size such as 2 GB or 10 GB is easier to download than one huge file, and a failed download costs you less.
  10. Click Create export.
  11. Wait for the email, then download every file from it.

Google says your export expires in about 7 days, and each file can be downloaded only 5 times. If you miss the window or hit the limit, you have to make a new export. So download all the files soon after the email arrives, and keep them in one folder.

Why the dates look wrong, and why that is normal

When you unzip a Takeout export, most photos come with a second file ending in .json, named after the photo. It holds details Google Photos keeps about the picture, such as the date it was taken, the location and any description. In newer exports the name may end in something like .supplemental-metadata.json instead of plain .json. Either way, keep them.

The result is that your computer can show the wrong date. Google notes that your operating system may give the downloaded file a new date based on when you downloaded it, while the original date stays stored inside the photo itself. Photo programs that read that stored date will sort your photos correctly. File Explorer and Finder may not.

This is normal and fixable. Nothing has been lost. There are free tools and scripts that read the .json files and write details back into the photos. Photos taken on a phone or camera usually keep their date inside the file, so most of them will be fine. The ones that need help are mainly screenshots, downloads, edited copies and images that came from messaging apps.

Each export also includes a file called archive_browser.html, which explains how the contents are laid out.

Albums, year folders and duplicates

Takeout lays your photos out in two ways at once:

  • Folders named Photos from 2019, Photos from 2020 and so on, which hold your photos by year.
  • One folder for each album you made.

A photo that is in an album usually appears twice: once in its year folder and once in the album folder. Google’s help pages don’t describe this, but university IT guides and the people who make Takeout tools all report it, and it makes the export bigger than your library. Don’t untick the albums to save space, though. Not every album photo is guaranteed to have a copy in a year folder, so it’s safer to download both and remove duplicates afterwards. Edited photos may also come out twice, once as the original and once as the edit.

Partner sharing

If your partner shares their library with you, only the photos you chose to save to your own account become part of your library. Google says saved photos appear in your account and in search, and unsaved ones stay in the partner sharing space. University IT guides that walk through Takeout agree: photos you saved from a partner are in your export, and photos you never saved are not. If you want copies of your partner’s photos, save them to your library first, or have your partner run their own export.

Albums other people shared with you follow a similar rule: do not assume they are included unless you have added the photos to your own library.

When to stop and get help

If the export keeps failing, the files will not unzip, or your account has been locked, stop and ask for help. Do not delete your Google Photos in the hope of starting over.

If you’re a Photo Organizing Co client

Start the Takeout export as soon as your job is booked, because it can take days and the links last only about 7 days. When the email arrives, download all the files into one folder and keep every .json file. Do not unzip and tidy, do not delete the .json files, and do not delete anything from Google Photos. If you are not sure whether you have everything, tell me and we will check before you do anything else.

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