Mac Photos library viewable without using icloud?

[JesterJJZ]

Looking for some advice.

I'm planning on getting a MacMini for my mother this winter. I've slowly been getting her into the Apple ecosystem and she honestly loves it.

She has a large photo library going back over 15 years. I have it all organized by year in folders on a drive. I'm hoping I can find a way to move that over to the new MacMini and give her a way to access all of it on her ipad and iphone as long as the Mac is online. Also hoping I can do this without needing to upload everything to icloud. She has the 200GB plan and I'd rather not need to spring for the 2TB one. Especially if just to browse for a photo on occasion.

Ideally she would use icloud photo sync as normal and like once a year archive photos she doesn't need to keep on her iphone to her Mac.

I feel like there a solution here somewhere but I'm not thinking of it.

 

[aperfectcircle]

You can use file sharing and then the Files app on the iPhone to access the shared folder on the Mini.

 

[JesterJJZ]

You can use file sharing and then the Files app on the iPhone to access the shared folder on the Mini.

I thought about that and it seemed like the solution, but when I connected my iPhone to my MacPro to test, I was able to browse files, but there was no image previews. It currently has pretty limited functionality. I'd want my mother to easily browse with thumbnails in a way she's already familiar with.

I did find this app though, seems to do everything I would want, even in the free version. The pro version has some cool backup and sync features I might looking into.

Owlfiles