Synology Photos is the Synology counterpart to Apple Photos or Google Photos — photo management with auto-upload, album browsing, face and object recognition, sharing. For most of our private customers, it’s the second most important package after Drive.
Photos fills a gap Drive doesn’t cover: Drive syncs all files generically, Photos understands photo-specific metadata (EXIF, GPS, date) and makes it searchable.
1. Enabling Photos on the Synology
If you wanted Photos when ordering, it’s already running. Otherwise:
- Package Center → search for “Synology Photos” → Install.
- After installation: click the Photos icon in the DSM app list.
On first launch, you’re asked whether you want to store into the personal space or the shared space:
- Personal: photos live in
home/Photos/— only you see them (unless you actively share). - Shared: photos live in
photo/— all users with permission see them. Handy for family photos.
In practice, many use both: personal photos private, family photos shared.
2. Auto-upload from your smartphone
Get the Synology Photos app from the App Store or Play Store. Log in with your DSM credentials.
In the app menu → Settings → Photo backup:
- Tap Enable backup.
- Source: which folders should be backed up (camera roll, screenshots, etc.).
- Destination: where on the Synology — default is
Personal Space/Photos/Mobile. - Conditions: only over Wi-Fi, only while charging, only during certain time windows.
Our recommendation: Wi-Fi only (otherwise auto-upload eats your mobile data), backup only while charging (otherwise the battery drains fast).
The first-time backup can take several hours up to two days, depending on your photo library. After that, individual new photos go through in seconds.
3. Enabling face recognition
Photos can automatically detect faces and group people across pictures — like Apple Photos. Default: enabled.
In Settings → Account → People recognition: enable or disable.
The computation runs on the Synology itself — no pictures are sent to any cloud. The Synology’s CPU spins up briefly for it; with large libraries you’ll notice during the first scan.
After recognition, go to People (left menu) and name the groups. From then on, you can filter photos of a specific person with one click.
4. Creating albums
In Photos: Albums → + → pick an album name → select photos.
There are three album types:
- Manual: you pick the photos yourself.
- Condition-based: the album fills itself automatically — by date, location, person, camera model, etc. Handy for e.g. “Italy 2025” (all photos with GPS in Italy from 2025).
- Shared: an album with a sharing link; others can look in or contribute.
5. Sharing links
Same as Drive: select a photo or album → Share → create a link with password and expiry date.
Handy for e.g. sending a family-party album to relatives. We always recommend password plus expiry date, because photo links tend to get forwarded.
6. On Mac and PC
Photos has no desktop client of its own — there’s the web interface and the mobile apps, nothing more. On a Mac or PC, you use the browser: https://<deine-domain>/?launchApp=SYNO.Foto.AppInstance. Uploads work there via drag-and-drop straight into the window.
If you want computer photo folders uploaded automatically, let the Synology Drive client sync the Photos folder (home/Photos) along. Some do exactly that: Drive client for the sync, Photos web UI for viewing — both work simultaneously on the same Photos folder.
Migrating from iCloud Photos
A classic use case with us: someone wants out of iCloud Photos. It works like this:
- Request the iCloud export: at Apple, go to
privacy.apple.com→ request a copy of your data. After 1–7 days, Apple sends a download link with your complete photo library as a ZIP. - Unpack the ZIP on your Mac.
- Upload: smaller libraries via drag-and-drop into the Photos web UI. For large libraries, more convenient: sync the unpacked folder into the Photos folder (
home/Photos) with the Synology Drive client. - Wait — a 200 GB library over DSL takes about 6–10 hours, considerably faster over fiber.
- Once everything is up, disable iCloud Photos on the iPhone and enable Synology Photos auto-upload. From that day on, new photos land with you, not in iCloud anymore.
If the library is huge: ask us — we can also accept an external drive (by mail or drop-off in Düsseldorf), which is considerably faster than the wire.
Best practices
Back up RAW files too: if you shoot RAW, explicitly include the RAW folder in the auto-upload settings. Auto-detect sometimes misses it.
Multiple backups: Photos on the Synology is one copy. A real backup you do additionally with Hyper Backup to a target outside your Synology (for example our Hyper Backup Storage) — we’ve had cases where an accidental mass deletion in Photos couldn’t be reverted anymore because of the version limit.
Check EXIF dates: some smartphones store the local timestamp, others UTC. If your photos land at the wrong time in Photos, adjust the timezone handling in the app settings.
Indexing can take a while: with 50,000+ photos, the initial indexing with people and object recognition takes several days. It runs on the Synology during low-load phases — non-blocking, but features like “filter by person” only become fully usable after indexing.
Frequently asked questions
What’s the difference to Synology Drive? Drive syncs generic files. Photos understands photo metadata (EXIF, GPS, people, objects) and builds a searchable library from it. If you just want to drop a few JPGs somewhere: Drive is enough. If you have lots of photos and want them organized: Photos.
Can I point Drive and Photos at the same folder?
Technically yes, but we advise against it. Photos writes sidecar files (.@SynoEAStream/) into the folder, Drive syncs those along, and that eats bandwidth. Better to give Photos its own folder.
What if I delete photos locally in Photos? They land in the recycle bin on the Synology — gone after 30 days. Until then, recoverable. Older versions are not preserved (unless you have snapshots enabled — see Snapshot Replication).
How much storage does a typical setup need? Rule of thumb: 4–6 MB per photo, 200–500 MB per minute of video (depending on quality). A family iPhone setup often produces 100–200 GB per year.
Can Photos handle HEIC files? Yes. Photos displays HEIC images directly, without converting them. On export via a sharing link, HEIC is usually delivered as JPG (depending on the recipient’s device); the original stays untouched.
Do Live Photos work? Yes, both parts (the still image and the short video file) are uploaded and shown as a Live Photo in the app. Via sharing links, recipients only get the still — the video part is Apple-proprietary.
What about Apple-specific features like iCloud Memories? Synology Photos has its own “memories” features (in the mobile app under “Highlights”) that work similarly. Apple Memories themselves don’t come along, because they’re Apple-proprietary.
What’s next
First login to DSM after provisioning
What to do first after ordering your Synology from us — login, language, initial security, and getting a few important defaults right from the start.
Securing the admin account on your Synology — 2FA, password, login protection
A Synology exposed to the internet is a brute-force magnet. Here's how to harden the admin account, protect against login floods and sleep better at night.
Setting up Synology Drive for file sharing and sync
Synology Drive is the Dropbox replacement on your Synology — sync client, sharing links, version history. Here's how to get it running.
Configuring Snapshot Replication for version protection
Btrfs snapshots protect your data against ransomware, accidental deletion and broken updates. What it is, how to set it up, and why it doesn't replace a backup.