Open Radar

 
Summary: Big usability problem - how do I delete full-res photos from iPhone but not from iCloud Photo Library?

Steps to Reproduce:
I’m using the iCloud Photo Library beta. I have 28,000+ photos in iCloud Photo Library. I’m using the “Optimize iPhone Storage” option for iCloud Photo library.

So I have a bunch of photos that I’ve taken with my iPhone, that I don’t want the originals stored on my iPhone any more, I just want them in iCloud. (Mainly for space saving reasons… they are even duplicated in my iCloud quota because one is accounted for in my device backup, and one in my iCloud Photo Library quota).

I don’t see any UI indication to know if a photo is stored local to the phone, or in iCloud Photo Library only.

If I try and delete one that is know is on the phone (i.e. most recently taken one) my only option is an action sheet that says “This photo will be deleted from iCloud Photo Library on all your devices” and a red “Delete Photo”. I don’t want to do that. (You could put a second action sheet option for “Delete from iPhone”

What if I just want to clear it off my phone?

I thought I might be able to use Image Capture to do this, but when I try it, it doesn’t let me delete individual photos any more. It used to. 

I think two things are needed:

- Some sort of indication that a photo exists on your iPhone in full res. I’m not sure what this should look like. A badge over a photo? A smart album of local photos?
- A way to delete a full-res photo *just* from your device, but leave it in iCloud Photo Library so I can still look at the thumbnail and download the full res version. Ideally there would be a simple way in the UI to delete ALL local full-res photos so I don’t need to individually go through all 306 that are on there right now.