There’s still time to download your Flickr photos before they’re gone forever

February 9, 2019

By Kim Komando

Flickr’s been the go-to place to upload and share photos for well more than a decade. And it’s evident since there are millions of users who have – until now – been able to upload a seemingly unlimited amount of photos and videos.

But times change and with a lot of companies, so do the owners. Last year, another photo-sharing company called SmugMug bought Flickr from Yahoo. And now, there are some changes coming to free accounts.

Bonus: If you were to lose your phone, what would you miss most?

So if you have a lot of images stored on the social networking site, you’ve got a decision to make. Pay to keep them there, or download your files to keep them under a certain cap. If you don’t, you risk losing them forever. And the clock is ticking.

Download your photos before it’s too late

You used to get a terabyte of free storage through a free Flickr account, but those days are no more. Now you need to mark the date of March 12. Because the new limit on free accounts is 1,000 images, and if you have more than that, Flickr will start deleting them then.

It’s not the easiest process to remove your content, and it’s led to some complaints. And that’s why Flickr extended the original deadline from Feb. 5. But if you’ve decided to clear out some old photos, or leave altogether, here’s how to remove your files.

• Once you’re logged in, hover over the menu option called “You” and click on “Camera roll.”
• Then click on “Select all” from each date, but you can only do it 500 at a time.
• Next, click “Download” at the bottom, then “Create zip file” and you’ll get an email when they’re ready.
• Note: If you’ve got them in Albums, you can download them in batches of 5,000.

Now if you want to keep everything as it is, you can for a fee. Upgrade to Pro membership for unlimited storage and no ads, but it’ll cost you either $6 a month or $50 annually. But there are some more affordable options out there.

Popular alternatives to Flickr

So let’s look at some Flickr alternatives. First, there’s Amazon. You can get unlimited photo storage for free, as long as you’re a Prime member. If you don’t have a membership, you can get 5GB free through Amazon Drive. If you need more storage, there are different tiers. Get 100GB a year for $12. For 1TB, it’s a little steeper at $60 annually.

Bonus: A free way to edit your photos

Then there’s Google Photos. Now if you already have a Google account, like through Gmail, you already have 15GB of free storage right now. If you’re looking for more, you can add storage space through Google One. For $2 a month, get 100GB, $3 monthly will get you 200GB and you can get 2TB of storage for $10 a month.

And you might also consider Imgur. It’s a free photo-sharing website, with no limits. But you’ll need to be OK with memes since that makes up most of the content shared by other users.

We may receive a commission when you buy through our links, but our reporting and recommendations are always independent and objective.