How to Transfer Photos from iPhone to External Hard Drive

Photos stored on iPhones save much important information for users. As the number of photos increases, you may need to transfer photos from your iPhone to an external hard drive when you need to free up iPhone storage space or back up your photos.

How to easily finish the process with or without a computer? This post will give you all the answers! Just keep on reading and choose the most suitable way!

Method 1. Best way to transfer iPhone photos to external hard drive from PC

When you need to move a large number of pictures from iPhone to USB drive, using a wired way is very nice. And a professional iPhone data transfer software, FoneTool will meet all your needs.

Now you can follow the guidance below to get how to transfer photos from iPhone to external hard drive using PC.

Step 1. Connect your iPhone and external hard drive to your Windows computer with USB cables. Click the Phone Transfer option > Go to iPhone to PC > Click Get Started.

Step 2. Choose photos or videos you need under the Photos/Videos tab and click OK.

Step 3. Choose your USB drive as the destination from the Transfer Settings to save photos > Click Start Transfer to begin.

Method 2. How to transfer photos from iPhone to USB with Windows File Explorer

For Windows users, the built-in File Explorer will be another available way.

Step 1. Connect your iPhone and USB flash drive to the computer. You may need to click Trust on iPhone to allow your computer to access your photos.

Step 2. Go to Computer or This PC, and you see a new device named xxx iPhone.

Step 3. Double-click the iPhone and open Internal Storage > DCIM folder, then preview your photos here and move photos from iPhone to flash drive via Copy and Paste.

Method 3. How to transfer photos from iPhone to external hard drive on Windows 8/10/11

For Windows 8, 10 and 11 users, the Photos app on your PC can also help you easily copy photos from iPhone to external hard drive.

Step 1. Connect your iPhone to the PC and unlock it > Click Trust and type the password if you are asked to Trust this computer.

Step 2. Launch the Photos app > Click Import and select From a connected device. After that, it will automatically detect your photos on the device.

Step 3. According to your need, unselect the photos you don’t want to import > Click Import Selected to continue. After the operation is finished, you can see it in your Pictures folder.

Step 4. Now you can connect your external hard drive to the computer > Drag and drop the moved pictures from computer to it.

Method 4. How to transfer photos from iPhone to hard disk with iCloud

You can also upload iPhone photos to iCloud, them download them to your USB drive. iCloud only offers 5 GB of free storage, if there are too many photos need to be uploaded, you may need to buy more storage or choose other reliable ways to begin the task.

Preparation: Upload photos from iPhone to iCloud

Before the process, you need to launch the Settings app on your iPhone > Tap the profile on the top of the screen > Choose iCloud > Photos > Enable the iCloud Photos or iCloud Photo Library option to upload photos to iCloud.

Now you can download photos from iCloud to your external hard drive.

Option 1. How to transfer photos from iCloud to external hard drive via iCloud.com from PC

For Windows users, you can go to iCloud's official website to download your photos to the external drive.

Step 1. Go to https://www.icloud.com/ on your PC and log in with your account.

Step 2. Click the Photos icon > View all uploaded iCloud photos > Choose the data you need and click the download icon to download photos to your PC.

Step 3. Once the download process is finished, you can connect your hard drive to the computer and move photos from computer to it.

Option 2. How to move iCloud photos to external hard drive with professional iCloud manager

Except for iPhone data transfer, FoneTool is also a professional & safe iCloud data management tool.

Highlights:

· Efficiently download, upload or delete iCloud (Drive) data from Windows computer.
· 1000+ pictures can be downloaded in 20 minutes without any data loss and unknown error.
· FoneTool applies professional SSL encryption and will never access any information on your account.
· You can also sync data from one iCloud account to another in one click.

Now you can download it on your Windows PC and get iCloud pictures to your external drive like SSD, HDD.

Step 1. Connect your external drive to the PC > Install and open FoneTool > Go to My iCloud > Log in with your account > Choose Manage iCloud to continue.

Step 2. Go to the Photos option > Choose the data you need > Click the Download button.

Step 3. Set your hard disk as the Download Location from the pop-up window > Click Download to confirm your choice.

Option 3. How to move iCloud photos to external hard drive on Mac

If you are a Mac user, you can use the desktop app to directly finish the process. Before the process, you have to make sure that iCloud Photos is enabled on your Mac (Go to Photos app on Mac > Choose Photos > Settings > Click iCloud > iCloud Photos).

Step 1. Connect your hard drive to the Mac > Launch the Photos app from your computer > Choose the photos you need.

Step 2. Click File in the upper-left menu bar and choose Export.

Step 3. Check the export settings to see if there is anything you need to change and click Export to start.

Step 4. Set your hard drive as the export destination and the photos will be moved from iCloud to the external hard drive.

Method 5. How to transfer iPhone photos to external hard drive using Mac

If you are using a Macbook, you can rely on the built-in Image Capture software to save iPhone photos to a thumb drive.

Step 1. Connect your iPhone and flash drive to the Mac at the same time. Open Image Capture on your Mac.

Step 2. On the left side of the interface, click your iPhone under the Device section. Click the Import To pop-up menu, then choose to save the pictures to your hard drive.

Step 3. Choose Import All to transfer all the items or select specific images you want to transfer and click Import.

Method 6. Transfer photos from iPhone to external hard drive without computer

Can you transfer photos from iPhone directly to external hard drive? The answer is Yes!

For people who don’t want to export iPhone photos to external hard drive via a computer, using a Lightning to USB adapter or a USB-C cable will be a good way.

Step 1. Connect your iPhone directly to an external hard drive with the Lightning to USB adapter or a cable > On your iPhone, go to Files > Browse to check whether the external hard drive is connected successfully.

Step 2. Launch the Photos app > Select the photos and videos you want to export > Tap the Share button, and then choose Save to Files. Tap on My iPhone and select the external hard drive to save your photos.

Conclusion

This passages tells you all things about how to transfer photos from iPhone to external hard drive with or without a computer. For Windows users, FoneTool will be a right way, especially when you need to move a large number of photos. And for users who need to know how to transfer photos from external hard drive to iPhone, it’s also useful.

For Mac user, you can use iCloud or he built-in Image Capture software to easily accomplish the action. If you don’t have a computer on hand, you can also use a adaptor or a cable to connect the external hard drive to to your iPhone directly.