Ask HN: Is there no way to incrementally backup from Google photos?

I'm sorting out all my backups and just got around to Google photos.

It seems that the options for backup are:

1. Use takeout to get a single backup.

That's it.

There is no way I can tell to get incremental backups. It seems that there used to be[0][1], but some permissions changes on Google's side made them impossible.

Is there really no way to do this?

What alternatives are worth considering for a cloud based photo tool, that actually allows you to backup?

[0] https://rclone.org/googlephotos/#limitations

[1] https://github.com/gilesknap/gphotos-sync

4 comments

[ 0.55 ms ] story [ 24.4 ms ] thread

pettycashstash2 9mo ago ↗

I am interested in this as well. Thanks for asking.

mijoharas 9mo ago ↗

Options I have found:

Somewhat manual, using takeout (seems a lot of effort): https://www.markhansen.co.nz/google-photos-backup/

A script using a headless browser (maybe scriptable, but sounds brittle): https://github.com/vikas5914/google-photos-backup

mijoharas 9mo ago ↗

Does anyone use immich?[0].

Can it be used alongside Google photos so as pictures are taken they're backed up to both services?

[0] https://immich.app/

magarnicle 9mo ago ↗

My method is to backup the photos 'at source', and treat Google Photos as another backup location. So I use Syncthing on my phone to copy new photos to my PC where I can do whatever backup strategy I like (restic, rclone and Backblaze in my case). The Google Photos app on my phone is also sending them to the cloud for convenience.