Do you think Apple will increase the poor 5GB of free icloud storage at WWDC? It is truly ridiculous that Apple isn’t giving more than 5GB of storage in 2018. With their premium products the free cloud space should be at a minimum of 50GB.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Other Free icloud storage increase at WWDC?
- Thread starter petsk
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Considering that my iMessages take up 2.6 GB on my phone, I’d suspect Apple knows that this new feature will finally cause people to hit the 5 GB limit.
I’ve only used iCloud to sync my calendar and address books.
I’m not naive enough to think this iMessage thing comes without a catch. It’s in there somewhere. Even if it’s just a future plan.
I’m not ready to risk my message archive against whatever future changes might be coming.
If at some point Apple evolves iCloud (which has been known to happen) the transition could cause difficulty reclaiming our message history.
If they adjust the pricing terms, we could likewise be facing a challenge getting our messages reclaimed unless we want to just accept paying to keep our messages.
From what I’ve seen so far, it doesn’t look like this has been the smoothest transition of merging multiple devices message histories and synchronization.
Not that it’s been terrible. Some have had good experience. Some have had glitches.
Until I see consistent reliable behavior, it’s still a gamble.
But, to the original question, I don’t see Apple increasing the free storage amount. That doesn’t fit in line with the modern Apple.
But, if the adoption stalls due to iMessage space, perhaps they’d increase the allowance.
I’ve only used iCloud to sync my calendar and address books.
I’m not naive enough to think this iMessage thing comes without a catch. It’s in there somewhere. Even if it’s just a future plan.
I’m not ready to risk my message archive against whatever future changes might be coming.
If at some point Apple evolves iCloud (which has been known to happen) the transition could cause difficulty reclaiming our message history.
If they adjust the pricing terms, we could likewise be facing a challenge getting our messages reclaimed unless we want to just accept paying to keep our messages.
From what I’ve seen so far, it doesn’t look like this has been the smoothest transition of merging multiple devices message histories and synchronization.
Not that it’s been terrible. Some have had good experience. Some have had glitches.
Until I see consistent reliable behavior, it’s still a gamble.
But, to the original question, I don’t see Apple increasing the free storage amount. That doesn’t fit in line with the modern Apple.
But, if the adoption stalls due to iMessage space, perhaps they’d increase the allowance.
Yeah but you can still retrieve Messages from your backups anyway right (assuming you're going from iPhone to iPhone)?
But would recent backups have your messages? Or would you have to go to older backups that would be missing recent messages?
Consider that with the iCloud setting, that iMessages are stored in the cloud, not your phone.
For example, if I turn off iCloud syncing, I lose my calendar history and contacts.
I’ve attempted working around that before on my Mac with backups and exporting. Only to find all attempts unsuccessful since the address book and calendar are actually empty.
So restoring from a backup that contains no data is useless.
If iMessages are handled similarly, then your backups will be useless as well if you had iCloud syncing enabled.
Increasing free storage? Nope.
Increasing paid storage? I hope a 2x bump.
Increasing paid storage? I hope a 2x bump.
If you use a program like iMazing, you can backup your messages, and untick the option to purge any backup older than 30 days. That should enable you to keep as many complete backups as you want, and still have your messages.
Apple and free don't usually go together. I don't see them giving a free cloud increase.
Apple and free don't usually go together. I don't see them giving a free cloud increase.
I don't think Apple will want to do anything that might risk shrinking services revenue that is increasingly important to its overall growth story. So I'll be shocked if there are any meaningful changes to the free storage tier.
Appleinsider had a story about a free month's trial of paid tiers. The advent of iMessage in the Cloud should prompt at least a larger free tier.
Well you can make the argument both ways. Does Apple really need to chase $12 a year for storage when customers are paying them $1000+ for a device every 1-2 years? There's no doubt it does lessen the customer experience, as John Gruber has often said on his popular podcast, but as he also says it's easy for us others to spend Apples money.
Personally I fall in the don't be cheap camp. If you can afford to buy iPhones and iPads, you can afford to up your cloud storage to something more useable. Apple pricing is actually very competitive in this area.
At the very least they should give 5GB free per device you’ve purchased. At present you are penalized for having more devices since each one takes up a lot of space for iCloud backups. I’ve just disabled iCloud backup and instead backup to local iTunes. Plus I’ve switched to Google Photos. iCloud is barely used
I have no issue giving Apple $0.99/month for 50GB iCloud storage. Been doing it for over a year now. I doubt Apple will bump the free storage anyway.
5GB free is an absolute joke, but it did get me to pay for the 50GB tier, so mission accomplished.
For some, it’s not about the current cost. We all know that costs rise once enough people have come to rely on something.
If you can find a way to accomplish the task you need, without getting yourself into a perpetual subscription that will be difficult to leave later, then that is best.
Things like Netflix... sure subscribe. If you turn it off later, you’re no worse off than you were before.
Things like my message history becoming trapped, that I’m not willing to gamble.
I’ve already read a lot of posts where there’s data / messages lost as they get into trying to get the feature working.
I’m not willing to gamble with that.
And given that once I’m in, it might not be easy to get out without losing messages, I’m not prepared to gamble that either.
I read the comments of perhaps putting them into a pdf etc... but that’s not useful if you have messages for legal reasons. The message must be on the phone in it’s orig form and verified untampered.
The transition in hasn’t been smooth for many. It’s really not looking like it’s going to be an easy transition out.
And if you turned off the feature, and restored from a backup that existed before the feature was enabled, you’d lose anything that was recent.
Not that I think it will happen under Tim Cook, but I would smile if they bump it to 100GB/month for the $.
I don't complain for the price either, it's definitely no issue whatsoever. It's a no cost.
But such things were just so sweet under Steve. His spontaneous generosity & love for the Mac-community
For Tim we are just customers.
I don't complain for the price either, it's definitely no issue whatsoever. It's a no cost.
But such things were just so sweet under Steve. His spontaneous generosity & love for the Mac-community
For Tim we are just customers.
what? Steve died after icloud was already a thing, so I'm not sure how you're drawing that comparison. What other services was Steve giving out for free that other companies were not? Were you not there for when the original iphone was released and there was a lot of negative coverage over the price, and how apple lowered it months after release? Mobile me? Original macbook air? Your comment makes it seem like Steve somehow was throwing out money from the windows in Cupertino, as if he didnt answer to shareholders any more than Tim does now.Not that I think it will happen under Tim Cook, but I would smile if they bump it to 100GB/month for the $.
I don't complain for the price either, it's definitely no issue whatsoever. It's a no cost.
But such things were just so sweet under Steve. His spontaneous generosity & love for the Mac-community
For Tim we are just customers.
Steve was a unique guy. He had a way about him.
To use your analogy... Steve could have thrown money from the windows like confetti, and had the shareholders praising him the whole time. They would have believed him when he said trust me, it'll be fine, this will come back 10-fold. And, with the way Steve spoke, and the way he'd spin it, somehow it would.
Steve's unique position, was that he was brought back into a company that was dying. And, he helped it to not only recover, but to thrive. That gave Steve a huge amount of influence at Apple. Granted he could have eventually made enough mistakes to find himself booted out again. But, he had generally come back and done an amazing job. He had vision, and charisma. And, when he spoke, people listened. He may not have been right, but the way he spoke, you believed in him.
He was also at times humble when necessary. I don't specifically remember which speeches they were. But, I do remember a presentation of him humbly accepting some missteps, and promising to make it right, if we could take the lumps and move forward. A respectable characteristic.
I saw him make mistakes. I saw him do great things. There was a very human quality to him. And, you could see his vision. You could see his natural drive was to influence the world, take us to great places, and to bring us a new way of doing everything. He had a vision of the future, and that was his drive.
His successes gave him significant room to take a gamble, and the shareholders would go along with the idea.
Tim came into a less fortunate position in some ways. He came into a wealthy company that was already successful. His position is one to lose everything. So he is under tighter reigns. He hasn't proved himself to be the visionary that can likely succeed on a gamble that nobody understands yet. He has to tread the careful known path. And, in the end, that is very restricting. He can't announce a crazy thought, and say we're doing this. They'll tie his hands, afraid that he'll fail and resist the impulse change.
So, while the current trend is success, and money. The long term loss is there if you see it. Yes, they need to balance the books. But, without someone there to rock the boat, shake it up, and take a crazy gamble, they'll safely ride the rails next to all the other companies. A "me too" instead of suddenly rocketing off into the uncharted.
Crazy ideas are a gamble. But, crazy ideas are where the most amazing discoveries are made.