How to set up Google Photos and save all your photos and videos on Android

How to set up Google Photos and save all your photos and videos on Android. Google Photos is a gallery application, backup, photography and more, pre-installed on most Android phones. It is especially useful because you can save a backup copy of your photos in so you can retrieve them later on other devices or on a new mobile phone.

In this article we will see how set up Google Photos for the first time to save a copy of your photos, in addition to the different configurations available. Later we will see how to activate the backup all photos and not just those taken with the camera, which is the default configuration.

Set up Google Photos for the first time

The first time you open the Google Photos app, you are greeted with a small box where you are invited to activate the backup copy. In fact, the default is with backup already turned on, so you generally don't need to do anything other than continue.

Backup copies are associated with a Google user account, so you need to set up a Google account on your mobile device. If there are several, you can choose which one should be used in the drop-down menu above the Next button. If everything is correct and the copy is already activated, fai simply click Next.

Now is the time to make a decision: the quality of the backup. Basically you have two options: keep the original quality or reduce the size in exchange for unlimited space. This decision should generally be very simple to make, but the way Google names the different options is confusing. These are two options:

• original quality. The size and quality of the photos are kept, but the size of the photos is based on the storage space you have on Google Drive. Google accounts generally start with 15GB of free storage shared between Gmail, Drive, Photos, and the rest of the services.
• high quality. It reduces the size of photos to a maximum of 16 MP for photos (about 4920 x 3264 pixels) and 1080p for videos, but in return these do not take up space in Google's memory. That is, the backup space is unlimited.

There is no correct answer, but you have to choose which one suits you best. You can always change your mind later and even convert the original quality photos to high quality to have more free space in Google Photos. After pressing Confirmation, the backup will start, but only for photos taken by the camera

Save all your photos to Google Photos

The default configuration of Google Photos is that only those captured with the camera are saved, but not those of other applications such as downloaded images, screenshots or those created with a retouching program. To change this configuration, you need to go to the settings by tapping the menu button embedded in the search bar.

Although Google Photos will ask by notification if you want to save the photos in a folder whenever it detects that a new folder with images, the best to avoid these notifications, they are annoying, it is better to do it manually from the settings.

Once inside the settings, the first thing you will need to do is tap in the first section, called Backup and synchronization. Your Google account email address appears below, because this section is only available to those who are logged in.

Here you can review the backup configuration, see how much memory you used and change the backup quality if you want. To choose which folders on your device will be backed up, tap Backup folders on the device.

Now, you will have a list with all the folders on your mobile where it has been detected that there are images or videos. To turn on backup in Google Photos, use the switch next to your name. If you want to activate it for everything, activate all switches.

That's it, from this moment Google Photos will save the quality of the photos you have specified and when you have specified (Wi-Fi only, or even with data), all the pictures and Scatti with the camera and those in other folders from other applications.