If you're able to manage a Docker container, you could consider Immich. It works great, has client apps for iOS and Android. Open Source. I've been using it for a few years now.
this post was submitted on 21 Apr 2026
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Same, I set it up a few years ago and both me and my partner have been using it since then with no issues at all, it's completely replaced Google Photos for us.
We've also set up immich-frame and repurposed an old Google Nest hub to use as a digital photo frame.
Immich-frame has been on my todo list for a while. Need to get on that.
Timing is insane, i took out everything and put it on my NAS 2 weeks ago. Glad i removed everything.
GrapheneOS works great for me. Not a lot you can do on stock android that you can’t do on GrapheneOS. I would highly recommend anyone looking for privacy to look into it. Very very easy to install. Just make sure you have a Pixel phone that is unlocked. I’ve been using it as my daily driver for two years now.
It's also opt in. Although I'd be surprised if anyone commenting here is actually using google photos in the first place.
There'll be quite a few of us. I have no idea of the actual demographics or whatever, but a lot of people are here just because they got shafted by reddit one too many times.
It's also opt in
For now.
I've been dragging my feet moving to grapheneOS, but shit like this is going to encourage me to make the jump sooner than later
Why search for a doctor’s appointment when Google has access to all your calendar events. Why search for a party invite when it reads all your emails. And why search for a specific photo of you and your loved ones to create an image, when it sees all your photos.
They try very hard to sell this as something positive and not the privacy invasive nightmare it is.
Well thats just lovely
Pardon me, starts?
Exactly. It's google. They're scanning EVERYTHING. Even if you don't use google, they probably know about you from OTHERS' devices who are using google.
They weren't already doing this? I'm so glad that I downloaded all my photos and deleted them from Google Photos a few months ago with great hassle, I figured they would abuse them somehow if they hadn't already so decided to de-google.
Fuck all this shit.
Thanks family who insisted on digital copies.
That's a terrible article though and seems quite click-baity, it's hard to say what's going on just based on that.
It also says
We’re talking Personal Intelligence, Google’s latest AI upgrade path which lets users opt-in to connecting Google apps to Gemini.
If it's opt-in, it's fine, as long as the user knows what exactly they are opting in for.
Except anyone else that has ever taken my picture can opt-in for me, and I have no way of knowing if they did or not.
The way they are doing it is kind of sketchy though. They are replacing the old search functionality with Gemini and now if you click the search icon in Google photos it immediately pops up asking you to pick your own face. There's no option to skip this step, though you can still revert to the old search for now.
The creepy part is that when they ask you to select your face, it's pretty clear they've already figured it out, because it's the first face they show you.
Even when they say it's optional, it's never actually optional. They are always enabling it in the background and just preventing you from seeing that.
But even if they actually did use an opt-in system properly, they would still only do that for like 6 months, and then in the next update you'd be forced to use it. And who can stop them? There is no alternative.
No alternative? Immich and Ente are definitely an alternative Google Photos. It ain't that hard to degoogle these days.
There are services and websites that literally won't let you change your email, so if you used gmail to sign up, you're stuck with that email.
You can opt out with this trendy new cocktail that will be all the rage this summer!
Voiding my privacy, stealing my IP and opening me up to liabilities....and tis all legal... fuck all of you who gargled their balls and betrayed your own interests for what amounts to digital toys.
I appreciate the sentiment. One of the core conflicts I've had with family over the past couple decades has been their unrepentant usage of my data on these platforms. As a result, I never take or share pictures. They've responded over the years by casting suspicion on me, for not capitulating to the status quo, and for wanting to understand the nuts-and-bolts of technology. I've never shared mine nor others' data. I worked in the data economy for about a decade and still, they'd dismiss my well-founded concerns in favor of corporate propaganda and the ego-dopamine loop. "What do you have to hide?" Dumb fucks.
If you install immich in your homelab, you can just transfer all the images off your device very easily with the immich app.
Probably the only way to keep them private from big tech. But the long term solution is to not use the official Android or Apple systems and to root your phone and install cyanogenmod or something similar without Google apps.
But that means some apps wont work at all, so thats the price to pay for that freedom.
Or you can just buy a separate camera and stop using your phone for that.
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I warned most of my family and friends this was going to happen when I de-Googled and set up Immich and they all said I was paranoid.
I went back to Polaroid for my nudes.
I've gone even further back, having mine painted on Greek pottery
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I thought they always did this?
Decision to move to Immich on my own hardware years ago validated
Does it matter if you don't update? I imagine they already have it on their servers, which is where I imagine the photos are mostly processed.
Since decades, Google Photos is cloud storage. Update or no, they already got your photos for this.
I never activated cloud storage for Google Photos. Whenever I open it for some reason, it complains about it. I need something non-shittified to go through my gallery, just haven't looked for it very much yet.
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