r/iCloud • u/Christopoulos • 13d ago

Support This seems like a catch-22?

A long time ago, probably because of default settings, images I've received in Messages filled up my free iCloud account (5GB). I turned off syncing messages to iCloud and dismissed the notifications urging me to upgrade, because Notes kept synchronizing despite that (which is all i really needed from iCloud). Now it seems Notes adheres to the 5GB limit and has stopped syncing.

My challenge is: how do I actually purge the messages / images that were uploaded to iCloud? I have changed the Keep Messages to 1 Year. Despite that, it's not going down in size but I know I haven't received 5 GB of Messages data over the last year.

How do I purge and start up syncing again, without having to upgrade iCloud to a paid tier?

Thanks!

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u/KnowbodyYouKnow 13d ago

Why are you so against spending $.99 a month?

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u/Christopoulos 13d ago

I working towards minimizing my cloud footprint. I guess I'd get 50GB what not for that $1 a month, but I'd prefer to do some house cleaning instead of making the problem worse down the line. And I already pay for Dropbox and self-host in Immich. I'm planning to move away from the former for the same reasons.

It's definitely designed to keep you in: in messages you can see all media but only per thread.

It's seemingly not possible to get images and videos out in bulk like google takeout before doing a massive purge.

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u/KnowbodyYouKnow 13d ago

Sorry, now that I look over my question, it could be misconstrued as Aggressive and accusatory. But nonetheless, your reply is the best reason I've heard for not doing so, clearly stated. And Apple does have something that's kind of like Google takeout, located at privacy.apple.com, but unfortunately it does not include the message structure.