iCloud User Guide
- Welcome
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- Sign in and use iCloud.com
- Customise and use the homepage
- Keynote
- Numbers
- Pages
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- Photos on iCloud.com overview
- View your photos and videos
- Hide your photos and videos
- Use iCloud Shared Photo Library
- Upload and download photos
- Add a title or caption
- Organise photos and videos
- Add photos and videos to Favourites
- Play a slideshow of photos
- Delete and recover photos and videos
- Share photos and videos
- Recover files and information
- Use iCloud on your Windows computer
- Get more help with iCloud
- Legal notices and acknowledgements
- Copyright
Back up your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch to iCloud
You can use iCloud to back up your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. You can customise which apps and data are backed up.
For more information about what is included in an iCloud backup, see the Apple Support article What does iCloud back up? To learn about managing your backups, see View and manage iCloud device backups.
Turn on automatic backups
When you turn on iCloud Backup, iCloud automatically backs up your device information over Wi-Fi when your device is turned on, locked and connected to a power source.
On your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, go to Settings > [your name] > iCloud > iCloud Backup.
Turn on Back Up This [device].
If your device and network provider support it, you can also turn on Back Up Over Mobile to use mobile data with iCloud Backup instead of Wi‑Fi when Wi‑Fi is unavailable.
Customise which apps and data are backed up for a device
You can customise which apps and data are included in your iCloud backup.
Some Apple apps back up data in iCloud but are not included in the list of apps. You can only turn off the backup for listed apps.
On your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, go to Settings > [your name] > iCloud.
Do one of the following:
iOS 16, iPadOS 16 or later: Tap iCloud Backup.
iOS 15, iPadOS 15 or earlier: Tap Manage Storage, then tap Backups.
Tap the name of your device.
Note: Although you can see all the devices that have iCloud Backup turned on, you may only change which apps are included in the backup for the device you are currently using.
Turn the backup for each app on or off.
The apps list may be abbreviated. Tap Show All Apps to see a complete list.
Back up manually
After you turn on automatic backups, you can manually back up your device at any time.
On your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, go to Settings > [your name] > iCloud > iCloud Backup.
Tap Back Up Now.
Turn off automatic backups
If you turn off iCloud Backup for a device, any backups stored in iCloud are kept for 180 days before being deleted.
On your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, go to Settings > [your name] > iCloud > iCloud Backup.
Turn off Back Up This [device].
If you need help with iCloud Backup, see the Apple Support articles If you cannot back up to iCloud and If restore from iCloud backup failed.
You can also use your computer to back up your device. See the Apple Support article How to back up your iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.