Storage on iOS Devices

[bonei1973]

I am looking at migrating library to the new LR CC. I also plan to use lightroom on an iPhone and iPad.

Whilst I appreciate full size images are held in the cloud, I assume at least a small preview of EVERY image is downloaded to the devices?

If so, roughly how much space do these previews take (per file). Storage on iOS devices is tight and I can't see a way to be selective about what is downloaded?

[Ian Lyons · Accepted solution]

Assuming you have the prerequisite internet connection, a small preview image will be synced from the cloud to LrCC for iOS by default, and when you attempt to edit same larger version is downloaded. The default is the 'full sized' image, but you can change this to 'Smart Previews' only in Cloud Storage & Sync panel found in LrCC iOS 'Settings'.

Personally, I see no point in downloading a full size raw file to an iPad or iPhone. Therefore, I only download the smart previews, which I tend store locally on the device, thus avoiding the need to sync individual images on an as needed basis. Obviously, the size of each smart preview or full size image varies, but I usually find that 100 smart previews works out around 170 MB or 1.7 MB per smart preview. That being said, some can be larger or smaller. The small preview image doesn't take up a lot of space (e.g. 1000 requires approximately 30MB)

[bonei1973]

Thanks. V Helpful.

I get the fact that the small preview image is downloaded and that doesnt seem to take much space. With the smat previews, once you have stopped working with the photo, can you remove these (Is that the clear cache mentioned below?).

[selondon]

I have 70GB up there and it takes up about 1GB on my phone depending how often I access them.

If you Clear Cache it reduces the amount they take up also.