icloudpd
Fewer than 5 people recommend it so far, so there's no written verdict. Here is what commenters said.
4recommend
1warn against
Dec 5, 2025first mention
Jan 31, 2026latest mention
Why people recommend it
“icloudpd - https://github.com/icloud-photos-downloader/icloud_photos_downloader”
“I use this to sync my wife's photos to Immich and it works great”
Show 2 more
“Because icloudpd supports downloading photos from icloud and rclone does not (yet)”
“which seems like a pretty reliable syncing tool”
Caveats and dissent
“seems pretty high touch. A lot of hoop-jumping if you don't have a mac in the middle”
Often compared with
Threads where it came up
- Open-source iCloud Photos Downloader (AKA escape from iCloud) 2 mentions
- My Ridiculously Robust Photo Management System (Immich Edition) 1 mention
- Apple, What Have You Done? 1 mention
- Apple has locked my Apple ID, and I have no recourse. A plea for help 1 mention
- Self-hosting my photos with Immich 1 mention
Data: icloudpd.json. Quotes are verbatim; the verdict and theme labels are written by a model from these comments, and every clause links to its sources.
All comments 6
Check out icloudpd. It’s a bit fiddly but it definitely does work once you have it set up.
“icloudpd - https://github.com/icloud-photos-downloader/icloud_photos_downloader”
“I use this to sync my wife's photos to Immich and it works great”
“Because icloudpd supports downloading photos from icloud and rclone does not (yet)”
“seems pretty high touch. A lot of hoop-jumping if you don't have a mac in the middle”
“which seems like a pretty reliable syncing tool”