What Google changed, and when
For years, Drive for desktop had a Back up to Google Photos checkbox for folders on Windows PCs and Macs. Plenty of people used it to protect camera dumps, scanned family photos and DSLR imports without thinking about it again. As Android Police noted, this functionality is especially useful for power users who back up photos from DSLRs and other cameras to Google Photos and maintain a large library.
Google shut it down in two stages:
- June 15, 2026: From June 15, you won't be able to set up new backup folders for Google Photos via the Drive desktop app. Existing folders will continue to sync, though.
- August 10, 2026: From August 10, Google Drive's desktop app will no longer support Google Photos backups.
Google's Drive Help documentation confirms the same dates. It adds that in-app notifications started on June 15 to push users toward Google Photos, and that users must choose their backup folders again in the Google Photos interface.
A note on the timeline. How-To Geek, which covered the workaround this week, said the feature disappeared "with only three days' notice" and that Google announced it in August. The record says otherwise. Android Authority reported in May that Google announced on its support page and in emails to subscribers that the Google Drive desktop app will no longer support backups to Google Photos. Android Police added that the email went to users who relied on the sync feature. If you only noticed the change in August, you're not alone, but Google did give warning months ahead.
What did not change
- Your existing library is safe. Any items previously backed up to Google Photos via this method won't be affected by this change.
- Drive for desktop still works for Drive. Only the Google Photos backup function was retired. Folder syncing to Google Drive continues.
- Stopping a backup doesn't delete anything. Google Photos Help says stopping a backup only prevents future uploads. Existing photos stay in Google Photos until you delete them yourself at photos.google.com.
Section summary: Drive for desktop stopped backing up to Google Photos on August 10, 2026. Your uploaded photos are untouched, and Drive syncing still works. The warning came well before August.
Before you start: the browser requirement
How-To Geek's author used Chrome and couldn't find the feature in Firefox or Safari. That matches Google's own wording, which is more specific. Google Photos Help says automatic folder backup requires a Chromium-based browser such as Chrome or Edge.
That matters on Windows, where Edge is already installed. You don't need Chrome for this. Edge is explicitly supported.
If the option is missing, or you see a "Browser not supported" message, Google says to switch to a supported browser or update your current one to the latest version. The likely reason Firefox and Safari are excluded is that the feature depends on browser file-system access permissions that Chromium supports. That's an inference from how the feature behaves, not something Google has stated.
How to set up folder backup in Google Photos
These steps follow Google's current help documentation and How-To Geek's walkthrough:
- In Chrome or Edge, go to photos.google.com and sign in to the Google account you want to back up to. Google Photos backs up to only one account at a time.
- At the top right, click Create and add photos (the + icon).
- Under "Add photos," click Back up folders.
- Choose a folder on your PC. Any folder works. How-To Geek's author made a dedicated one called "For Google Photos."
- When the browser asks for permission to view and back up the folder's files, click Allow or Allow on every visit. Allow on every visit is the better choice if you don't want to be asked again.
- A panel shows the folder name, how many items it holds and how much storage it uses. So, you can keep a check on the data being used for upload. Click Add folder to add more folders.
What success looks like: The backup status at the top of your Google Photos library should move from "Preparing backup" to "Backing up photos" and then "Backup complete." To check a single photo, open it, click Info, and look under Backed up for its status and size.
Removing a folder
Go back to + > Back up folders, click the three-dot menu next to the folder, choose Remove, then confirm with Remove folder. Backup stops for that folder, but anything already uploaded stays in your library.
Section summary: Use Chrome or Edge, choose Back up folders from the + menu, grant permission, and check the status line at the top of your library.
The big catch: it only runs while the site is open
This is the main difference from Drive for desktop. Google Photos Help says that to keep backup running in the background, the Google Photos tab must stay open or the Photos web app must be running. If you close the tab, new photos in your folders won't upload automatically.
Android Police noted this downside when the change was announced. The feature requires the website to be open for the sync to work in the background. Neowin was blunter when the web feature first launched in 2024: unlike the Google Drive desktop app that automatically backs up your files in the background, you need to periodically visit the web version of Google Photos to back up selected folders.
How-To Geek suggests two ways to make this easier:
- Install Google Photos as a web app. In Chrome, click the install icon in the address bar (it looks like a monitor with a down arrow) and follow the prompts. Photos then gets its own window instead of sitting among your tabs. Edge can also install sites as apps. That's general browser knowledge, and the exact menu labels vary by version. Either way, Google says the app still has to be running.
- Turn on Background sync. In Chrome, click the site settings icon to the left of "photos.google.com" in the address bar, open Site settings, find Background sync, and set it to Allow.
Be realistic about what this gets you. Even with the web app installed and background sync on, How-To Geek's author had mixed results. Sometimes photos showed up almost instantly, and sometimes a manual refresh was needed. That's one person's experience, not a measured result, but Google doesn't promise upload timing either.
Common problems and what to check
| Symptom | Likely cause | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| No "Back up folders" option | Firefox or Safari, or an old browser | Use a current version of Chrome or Edge |
| "Browser not supported" message | Outdated or unsupported browser | Update the browser or switch to Chrome or Edge |
| New photos aren't uploading | Tab or web app closed | Keep Photos open or the web app running, then refresh |
| Some files never appear | Unsupported type or size | Check the limits below |
| Mac Photos Library won't back up | Not supported | Google says to use the Google Photos app on an iPhone or iPad instead |
File limits: Google Photos Help lists photos up to 200 MB or 200 megapixels and videos up to 10 GB, and every item must be larger than 256 × 256 pixels. Supported formats include JPG, HEIC, PNG, WebP, GIF, AVIF, most RAW formats, and common video containers such as MP4, MOV, MKV, AVI and WMV. Other file types may not work.
Storage: New uploads count against the same storage pool as Gmail and Google Drive. Google says files that are already backed up won't be uploaded again unless they were edited or deleted while being backed up, so adding a folder you'd already protected through Drive shouldn't upload everything twice.
Analysis: a step back that you can live with
In practice this is a step back. Drive for desktop ran as a background Windows service that started with your PC. The new method depends on a browser window you need to remember to keep open. A family PC that boots, gets used for email and shuts down may rarely run long enough to upload anything.
There's another gap Google hasn't addressed. Google's Drive documentation noted that Drive for desktop could back up photos and videos from a network-attached storage (NAS) device to Google Photos. Google doesn't say whether the browser method handles network folders reliably, so anyone who relied on that setup should test it before trusting it.
Google does have a case. The web method works on any PC with a supported browser, needs no installed client, and avoids a known Drive for desktop problem: Google's own documentation warns that a folder set to both sync with Drive and back up to Photos uploads media twice, using up storage.
Is it worth switching services over this? For most people already paying for Google One, probably not. Do two things, though:
- Check that it's working. After setup, add a test photo to a backed-up folder and make sure it shows up in your library.
- Don't rely on one cloud copy. Keep a local or external-drive backup for anything you can't replace. File History or a scheduled copy job in Windows can handle that.
Bottom line: Folder backup to Google Photos still exists, but it now lives in a Chromium browser tab instead of the system tray. Set it up in Edge or Chrome, keep the tab or web app open, check that photos are uploading, and keep a second backup for anything that matters.