In that location are a ton of great reasons why you'd want to transfer your pictures over to an external hard drive. First, photographs and videos can take upwardly a lot of space. And then, moving them off of your Mac's hard drive will free up your storage for other things. Maybe you want to proceed your photo library on your computer merely want to make sure y'all have a backup somewhere. Well, don't worry. This commodity volition testify you how to do both of those things and what y'all should practice before yous start.

Tips for how to move your Photos library to an external difficult bulldoze

Equally you'll run into later in this commodity, transferring over your pictures might non be as daunting as yous recall. But there are a couple of steps you lot should take before you start.

1. Clean up your Photos library

Your pictures and videos tin utilize a lot of space. The last thing you want to do is waste whatever of that storage on images you don't actually want, like duplicates and similar-looking pictures. Fortunately, the app Gemini 2 can browse your hard drive for all of the duplicate files on your Mac and will help you quickly get rid of them.

In one case yous have Gemini 2 downloaded and installed, follow these steps to clean up your Photos Library.

  1. Open Gemini ii.
  2. Click + > Pictures Folder > Scan for Duplicates.
  3. Choose either Review Results or Smart Cleanup.

If you want to see what Gemini's scan plant, you can click Review Results and select the files you desire to delete. On the other hand, Gemini uses an algorithm to choose the best version of your pictures, and you lot can get rid of all the additional copies by clicking Smart Cleanup.

two. Format your hard drive

Well-nigh external difficult drives work universally for both Mac and Windows computers. But, each of those operating systems has a unlike hard drive format they work better with.

Before y'all just start dragging and dropping your files over to your external drive, yous should make sure it's formatted the way you want. And that's because when y'all format or reformat a hard drive, you are completely erasing it. Then, salvage yourself the headache later and format it right from the offset.

As a general rule of thumb, your external hard drive should be formatted the same way the difficult bulldoze in your computer is formatted. Here's how you bank check the format of your internal drive:

  1. Open Disk Utility.

    2. Tip: Information technology's in the Applications > Utilities folder.

  2. Click on Macintosh HD in the sidebar.
  3. In the Type field, you'll see the format. It's usually APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

Now that you know what format your external bulldoze should be in, keep Disk Utility open up and follow these steps:

  • Connect your external drive to your Mac.
  • Click View > Evidence All Devices.
  • Select the hard bulldoze in the sidebar, so click the Erase.

    • Note: Do non click Macintosh Hard disk drive. That will erase your Mac's difficult drive.

  • From the Scheme popular-up menu, choose GUID.
  • Then, in the Format pop-up menu, select the file system format.
  • Enter a name for the deejay or book.
  • Click Erase.

3. Transfer your photos

Afterwards you've cleaned upward your library and formatted your external difficult bulldoze, so it's fourth dimension to transfer your pictures.

How to copy photos from Mac to an external hard drive

Manually, copying your pictures from your Mac to an external drive is pretty straightforward. And it's even easier if all of your images are in your Photos library.

Assuming all of your pictures in iPhoto or Photos, hither's how yous re-create over your library:

  1. Connect your external hard drive to your Mac.
  2. In Finder, go to your Pictures Binder.

    3. Annotation: If y'all don't meet Pictures in the sidebar, y'all can click Go > Home > Pictures.

  3. Drag your iPhoto or Photos Library onto your external hard drive.

If your images are non all saved in iPhoto or Photos, y'all tin follow these same steps only for step two, discover the folder with your pictures instead.

How to backup Mac photos to an external hard drive

In theory, manually dragging and dropping your pictures to an external hard bulldoze is a way of backing them up. Simply if you'd prefer something a footling more than automatic, then you lot should utilise the built-in macOS feature, Time Machine.

Follow these steps to enable Fourth dimension Machine:

  • Connect your external hard drive to your Mac.
  • Open System Preferences.
  • Click Fourth dimension Machine > Select Backup Disk.
  • Select your external hard drive and click Employ Deejay.
  • So, brand sure y'all check the box Back Upward Automatically.

Using Fourth dimension Car will back up your entire Mac, but yous can exclude specific folders if you'd similar by clicking the Options push.

Using an external difficult bulldoze for your pictures and videos can be incredibly helpful for saving space. Simply it'south also a keen way to brand sure all of your memories are backed up. Doing either is not difficult. Nonetheless, the steps you lot take to prepare for moving over your photo library can save you from a ton of headaches.