Move Google Photos to Amazon Photos: Takeout, the Desktop App and the 5 GB Video Catch
There is no direct transfer from Google Photos to Amazon Photos. Amazon's own instructions use Google Takeout and the desktop app's backup folder. Here is that route, with the two things that catch people: videos count against storage even on Prime, and some photo types are not supported.
There is no one-click transfer from Google Photos to Amazon Photos. Amazon's own help page describes the route: export your library with Google Takeout, unzip it, install the Amazon Photos desktop app, and add the unzipped folder as a backup folder. That works, but two things decide whether the move goes well: Prime's unlimited storage covers photos, not videos, and Amazon does not accept every file Google stored.
What Amazon Photos will actually hold
From Amazon's help pages on storage, checked October 2026:
| Account | Photos | Videos |
|---|---|---|
| Prime member | Unlimited, full resolution | 5 GB included |
| Amazon customer without Prime | 5 GB shared between photos and videos | |
| Paid storage plan | Extra space on top of the above, monthly or yearly | |
Amazon says unlimited photo storage applies to Prime members "in select countries", and that videos count toward the storage limit for everyone, Prime included. Amazon Photos is also for personal, non-commercial use only under its terms, so it is not an archive for paid client work.
If you cancel Prime later, you drop back to 5 GB. Anything above that makes the account over quota: you can still view and download, but uploads stop until you delete items or buy storage.
For a phone-heavy Google library, that 5 GB of video is the real constraint. The iPhone's own Record Video settings screen estimates about 170 MB per minute for 4K at 30 fps in its High Efficiency format, which puts 5 GB at roughly half an hour of footage. We cover the video side in detail in Amazon Photos video limit: what counts and what to do with the rest.
What Amazon will not accept
Amazon's file requirements page lists common photo formats (JPEG, HEIC, PNG, TIFF, WEBP, AVIF and others), common video containers (MP4, QuickTime, AVI, MTS and others) and RAW files from Nikon, Canon, Sony and Olympus. DNG support is described as "limited".
The same page lists these as unsupported:
- Google Motion Photos and Samsung Motion Photos
- Equirectangular panoramic photos, which is what a 360 camera's exported stills are
- 3D photos and lenticular photos
- Leica photos
File and folder names also have rules: under 255 characters, none of < > : " / \ | ? *, and no name ending in a space or a full stop.
Two groups of readers should pay attention here. If you shot on a Pixel or Galaxy phone with motion photos turned on, expect the moving part not to survive the move. If you shoot 360, your flattened 360 stills are on the unsupported list, so keep them on a drive.
Step 1: export with Google Takeout
Go to takeout.google.com, deselect everything, tick Google Photos and choose the email download link. A large library arrives as many numbered archives, and you have about a week to download them all. Our guide to Takeout split into many zip files covers part size, downloading every part and merging them into one folder. Merge everything before the next step, because a photo and its metadata file can land in different parts.
Step 2: put the dates back before you upload
Takeout keeps each photo's date, location and description in a separate JSON file next to it. Many files, especially screenshots, downloads and anything saved from a chat app, carry no date of their own, and a date or location you changed in Google Photos lives only in that JSON. If you upload as-is, those photos can land on the wrong day.
Fixing this after the upload means re-uploading, so do it now. Our guide to fixing Google Takeout photo dates and locations walks through exiftool and the ready-made tools.
The JSON files themselves are not photos. Once their data is written into the images, you can move them out of the folder so they do not end up in your upload.
Step 3: measure your videos
Before you upload, find out how much video you have. On a Mac, in Terminal, from the merged Takeout folder:
cd "$HOME/Takeout/Google Photos"
find . -type f \( -iname '*.mp4' -o -iname '*.mov' -o -iname '*.m4v' \
-o -iname '*.3gp' -o -iname '*.avi' -o -iname '*.mts' \) \
-exec stat -f %z {} + | awk '{s+=$1; n++} END {printf "%d videos, %.1f GB\n", n, s/1e9}'If the answer is well over 5 GB, decide now: buy an Amazon storage plan, keep the videos on a drive, or move them somewhere else. Uploading everything and letting the account go over quota pauses all further uploads, photos included.
Step 4: upload with the desktop app
Install the Amazon Photos app for Mac or Windows from amazon.com/photos and sign in. Amazon's steps:
- Open the Backup tab.
- Choose Add backup folder and pick the merged, date-fixed Takeout folder.
- Set how often it repeats and which file types to include, then Save.
The file-type setting is where you keep videos out if you decided to store them elsewhere. Amazon says transfers run in the background and resume after pauses, so a large library can run over several days without you restarting it.
The web uploader (the Add icon at the top right of the Amazon Photos site, then Upload photos or Upload folder) works for small batches, but it is the wrong tool for a whole library. Keep the computer awake while the desktop app works.
Expect duplicates from album folders
Takeout writes your photos into year folders and also into a folder per album, so the same photo can appear twice in the export.
Amazon says it skips items it recognises as already uploaded, but that the same photo from two sources can still appear twice, and that duplicates get no special treatment: each copy counts toward storage. With photos on Prime that costs nothing. With videos it eats the 5 GB.
If you only care about the photos, not the album structure, upload the year folders and skip the album folders. If you want a proper clean-up first, see how to find duplicate photos safely.
Check before you leave Google
- Count photos and videos in your local Takeout folder, then compare with what Amazon shows in its storage view, which is split into photos and videos.
- Scroll to a few years at random and open some photos and videos on the Amazon side.
- Look at the oldest and newest years specifically. Date problems show up at the edges.
- Keep the Takeout folder on a drive. It is your fallback if anything is missing, and it is a backup Amazon does not control.
Only once you are satisfied should you consider deleting anything from Google. If the reason you are moving at all is that Google says your storage is full, read Google storage full: what is actually using the space first. Photos are often not the biggest item.
When a different destination fits better
- You live in the Apple world. Google offers a direct transfer to iCloud Photos with no download needed. See Google Photos to iCloud.
- You shoot a lot of video. Amazon's 5 GB will not hold it. A drive, or a self-hosted library like Immich, has no per-type limit.
- You want a copy nobody can switch off. Whatever cloud you choose, keep a copy on a drive you own.