Is a shared Google Photos album enough for your wedding?
At a wedding with eighty guests a shared album runs into three things: your guests have to sign in to add anything, the storage comes out of your own 15 GB, and what you are left with is one strip sorted by date. For a small party it is enough.
the short answer
At a wedding, usually not. Google's own instructions for adding something to an album start with signing in to a Google account, every account has 15 GB that your backups come out of as well, and what you get back is a strip sorted by date rather than an album somebody arranged. For thirty guests who all have a Google account it is fine, and then there is nothing else to arrange.
How does a shared album actually work?
You make an album in Google Photos, turn sharing on and get a link. On its help page about shared albums Google describes that as a URL people cannot guess for themselves. You can have a QR code made of it too: Google's own help says you can generate QR codes for albums and share them physically or digitally, and that recipients who scan one open the album in Google Photos.
Whether guests are allowed to put anything in it hangs on a single switch. Google writes that when collaboration is turned on, anyone who has the link to your shared album can add photos. What stays yours alone: the page about creating and editing albums says only the creator can make changes, and that a contributor can add only photos and videos. The order, the title and the removal of somebody else's photos stay with you.
And it opens in Google Photos. Every one of Google's instructions starts with signing in to your Google account, and that is the point where it stops for some of your guests. Looking through a link usually works. Adding something is an action in the app or on photos.google.com, and there you are either signed in or you are not.
When is it simply enough?
More often than a site that sells something else will tell you. If this is your situation, there is nothing to arrange:
- Thirty to forty guests, and you know them all well enough to send each one a link.
- Everybody on Android, or at least everybody with a Gmail address they still remember.
- No screen in the room, no need for a moment when everything opens at once.
- You do not mind that photos are visible straight away to anyone with the link.
- You pull everything down within a few weeks and put it on your own drive.
Where does a shared album stop?
In four places, and all four are about the night itself rather than about the storage afterwards.
There is no screen for the room. You can cast: Google describes how to send a photo or an album from the app to a Chromecast. But the same page also describes what that looks like, which is that you open a photo and swipe through it yourself. That is not a screen that refreshes on its own while guests upload, and Google warns on top of that that the TV app is not in every smart TV app store. So somebody has to stand next to the projector with their phone all evening.
There is no moderation. With collaboration on, an upload is in there immediately. There is no queue where you look first, so if somebody posts something at half past two that does not belong there, it stays there until you take it out. What you can do about it when it happens anyway is in the piece on photos that do not belong.
There is no album that can stay closed. Everybody sees everything the moment it arrives, so the option of letting your guests upload all evening and only opening it on Sunday afternoon does not exist. Why couples want that is in the guide on keeping the album closed.
And it stays a folder. Everything lines up by date and time, so the ceremony, the photo of somebody's parking space and the dance floor sit in the same strip. You cannot run two albums side by side with one from the photographer and one from the guests, because a shared album is one album.
Three free or nearly free ways, side by side
| how | what your guest has to do | what you end up with |
|---|---|---|
| Shared Google Photos album | open the link, and sign in to a Google account to add anything | free, full size, one strip by date, up to 20,000 items |
| WhatsApp group | nothing, they are already in it | compressed thumbnails that are scrolled away within a month |
| QR code on the table | point the camera at it and pick photos, no app and no account | full size, in albums you arranged yourself, with a screen in the room |
That a shared album costs nothing is a real advantage, and it weighs heavier than most comparisons let on. What collecting does cost is worked out separately, including the answer that free is sometimes enough.
No account for your guests, and no cap on how many join in
Your guest points their camera at the card, picks their photos and is done. No app, no sign-in, no Google account. Unlimited guests on every plan, and the limit is on file size rather than on a number of photos per person.
Whose storage fills up?
This is the question that only comes up on the night itself. Google says on its storage page that every Google account has a maximum of 15 GB, and that photos and videos which have been backed up count towards it. At original quality they all count.
A guest who has been using Google Photos for years is often close to that. Video of the first dance is a few hundred megabytes on its own. What happens then is not that they tell you: they see a notification, think they will do it later, and you never hear about it again. That is one of the reasons the yield from a shared album comes out lower than the number of people who were at your wedding.
The same thing plays out on your side. If 400 full size photos plus a few videos come in, that comes off your 15 GB, and you share it with everything else in that account.
What people ask about this
Do guests need a Google account?
To add photos, in practice yes. Google's instructions for albums start with signing in to your Google account, and adding happens in Google Photos. Opening a link to look usually works without one. Google's own help pages never say this in one sentence, so test it before your day with somebody who has no Google account.
Can guests with an iPhone join in?
Yes. Google Photos exists for iOS just as it does for Android. But for an iPhone user it is more often an app they still have to install and an account whose password they have lost, and that is exactly the threshold where it goes wrong at half past eleven.
How many photos fit in one album?
20,000. That number is on Google's own page about creating and editing albums. For a wedding you will not go over it, so this is the limit to worry about least.
Can I see who uploaded what?
Yes, shared albums show who added something and people can comment on it. What you cannot do is hold something back before it becomes visible: with collaboration on, a photo is in there straight away.
What if somebody forwards the link to a person who was not there?
Then that person can get in. Google writes itself that a link, once created, can be passed on by others. You can reset it by turning sharing off and back on, after which the old link stops working, but then you have to send all your guests the new one.
Does the album stay up?
As long as your Google account exists and there is room. That is a real advantage over any service with an active period. Worth doing anyway: download everything to your own drive once, because an album sitting in the cloud is not a backup. How long photos stay up covers the same question on our side.
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