If you used Google's "Backup & Sync" before this update (Backup & Sync allows you to store, access and sync your Google Drive files from your computer), you may have a Google Photos folder inside your Google Drive folder. This Google Photos folder is not connected to the new Google Photos platform, so it will not sync its contents with the new Google Photos.
Conversely, your Google Drive folder on your computer will sync to the online Google Drive platform.
Summary:
you can sync Google Drive with a folder on your computer
you cannot sync Google Photos with a folder on your computer
you can upload photos from Google Drive on your computer to the new Google Photos platform
deleting photos from Google Drive on your computer will reflect in Google Drive, but not Google Photos cloud storage.
Can I still remove duplicates from Google Photos using Duplicate Sweeper?
Unfortunately, no. Although you can remove duplicates from your Google Drive folder on your computer, which will automatically reflect in your Google Drive cloud storage; you can no longer access Google Photos in a folder on your computer. As such, you can't delete Google Photos duplicates on your computer and sync them to the cloud.
The steps below detail how to remove duplicate photos from within Google Drive (not the new syncable Google Photos). If you have a "Google Photos" folder in your Google Drive, this will not sync with your Google Photos cloud storage. However, you can clean up space in your Google Drive by removing any duplicates in this folder.
Walkthrough Steps
Use Duplicate Sweeper to find and remove duplicate pictures stored in your Google Drive storage.
First of all, please ensure that your computer is synced with your Google Drive account. Download and install the Google Drive 'Backup and Sync' app from below.
The installer will take you through the necessary steps that you need to do to complete the install on your computer. Once the install is complete, the setup Wizard will open automatically. The Wizard will prompt you to enter your Google account information and sync your Drive with your computer. If the app does not open automatically, you can open it from the small icon in the toolbar in the bottom-right corner of your screen.
At the end of the Wizard, click Done. Google Drive will now be active on your computer, and will have created a folder called Google Drive. This folder will contain all of your synced data from your Google Drive Storage account.
Next, we can launch Duplicate Sweeper to scan your Google Drive for duplicate photos. Click Add Folder. Locate and select the Google Drive folder. Click OK to add the folder.
Now click the "Start Duplicate Search" button in the top-right corner of Duplicate Sweeper.
Duplicate Sweeper will now scan the folder and return a list of any duplicate files it has found. Tick the files in each group that you wish to remove, or press the "Keep All Newest Files" to automatically select the oldest files to remove. More selection preferences can be found under the Duplicates tab of the Duplicate Sweeper toolbar.
Files removed from Google Drive on your computer will also be removed from your online Google Drive storage. You can access your storage online at: https://drive.google.com
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