Synology Photos Overview & Review - Better than Google Photos?

[@vahpr]

Great review! I’m also impressed your dialog doesn’t sound like you read from a script yet has no ums or ahs, nicely done:)

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Thanks so much! I appreciate the kind words!

[@GregDolan]

Just found your channel... Exactly what I've been looking for to fill on my knowledge gaps on my Synology NAS... Thanks for great content 👍

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Thanks so much! I appreciate the kind words!

[@cyberwasp461]

One thing I suggested for a future update is that photos that are put into albums should have an indicator in personal space. Otherwise you don't know if it's in an album or not.

[@cyberwasp461]

as with most companies, they ignore feedback.

[@mikecollins967]

I'm new to Synology after 10 years on QNAP. I'm also a photographer with years of professional and personal stuff in that regard. I've have watched a BUNCH of Photos tutorials over the last few weeks and this one is by far the best. You explained the different setup of personal and shared areas plus albums better than any other I've found.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I appreciate the kind words! Glad the information helped!

[@allanmarsh1]

I've currently kept using PhotoStation on DSM6 simply because I take a lot of photos on a Canon Powershot camera and make extensive use of the Location/GPS search and tagging feature in PhotoStation. The fact that this is not present in any shape or form in Synology Photos, I find hugely disappointing.

[@unknownKnownunknowns]

This is so helpful! I set it up thanks to you. TO viewers: what are the best settings for sharing links to high quality, downloadable home videos to non-Synology uses through Photos? I manage the video/ photos for my sports team and they are frustrated by their viewing experience currently. The links play back with too much buffering , etc. Anyone who figure this out is a hero!

[@MWDAdventures]

My question is I am setting up my nas for the first time and have two many photos on my Mac in iPhoto. I mend to off load photos as my internal hard on my computer is almost full. So do I move them from iPhoto to synology photos or just build file folders and store them there?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

You can realistically do either. Moving the files to Synology Photos would work, or if you want to bypass Synology Photos entirely and just store them on your NAS, that will work as well.

[@bertubetubearg4502]

Thanks a lot for this review! :) It helped a lot to understand whether it is worth changing from Google Photos to Synology in terms of usability for the family

[@JohnTye]

I'm new to Synology so I see you did this video 2 years ago and I'm just now seeing it but it was perfect for what I needed thank you very much for taking the time and it was a great video

[@berndott10437]

The old PhotoStation in DSM6 was a very solid package that could even be used professionally to share images with clients and let them select their favourites. Besides many limitations that came with the new Photos package the possibly worst is square thumbnails in the folder view. It seems to be a trend about cute amateur apps to go this way as it looks pretty but if you ever looked through 300 similar images of people where the head is cut off you know why this is rather useless. I have been using both apps pretty extensively and would not recommend Photos and DSM7 to anybody who wants to seriously use their Synology NAS for image organisation and sharing. If it is an option: Stay with DSM6.

[@liroymona2661]

thanks for sharing.

[@hafizrehman1992]

Exactly what i was looking for as i am new to NAS and looking forward to migrate from Google photos to getting my own NAS. Please kindly tell me if Synology Ds120j is a good option for entry level NAS just for me and my wife and will be using for photos and probably plex media server if its a good entry level option

[@tonyphotiou1742]

Thanks for an informative video. I have a shared folder that sync’s with pCloud via WebDav/Cloud Sync. Currently all my photos are saved to a sub folder in that shared folder. How can I add the Synology photos folder, which is currently in home, so it can sync inside my pCloud shared folder? I tried setting up another WebDav connection for photos to pCloud, but I can’t have 2 connections. Is there a way to sync the photos folder with the existing pCloud shared folder within Synology?

[@Alzexza]

Man that was a good summary... especially the part about how to organise photos.. Thanks I really appreciate it

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Glad it helped! Thanks for watching!

[@SebbeSebbe]

Thank you very much for this! Great content

[@maxmayer6009]

Awesome review. Thanks for doing that. I am one of those people you mentioned who does not want auto upload. It would break my workflow and flood my NAS with bursts and other images not meant to be kept. That it doesn’t auto upload allows me to assess, edit and delete before upload. With little time invest in managing photos, I run everything over the iPhone, even ingestion from cameras via Wifi. I found the Synology interface a bit to technical and unintuitive. Google is much easier but those monthly fees go up steady. I use it as low quality back up for the worst case scenario. Maybe you could show us how to create an associated glacial storage that autobackups the NAS. I know there are providers but this is a bit too scientific to setup one evening from your phone…. Or is it?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I haven't used Glacial storage but I will look into it! I normally use Backblaze (which is the same setup process as S3, so you might want to check that one out).

[@hugolinprsnickus]

Hi, thank you for the review, I’ve just started delving into this subject. Want to ask something. Does Synology Photos keep the original photo/video I shot or it changes it, and how about Google photos and apple photos. the thing is, I switched from android space to iOS, but I have a huge historical collection of photos just stored in some folder on Synology. So I’m thinking about putting it all together on one platform in one big pile. But I don’t want them changed in case I will find out that the service doesn’t fit me and I want to use something else.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I unfortunately can't comment on Apple Photos, but Google Photos will upload your photos based on the configuration. Either it will be full quality or a scaled down version to save space. Synology saves it as the original photo. Doesn't hurt to try out Synology Photos if you have it.

[@hugolinprsnickus]

@@WunderTechTutorials thank you, i found out, that I have pretty big collection, almost 200G, so I am going to hit Synology Photos and let it organize that pile of pictures and videos.

[@charlesgonnaud1792]

As I see it, the shared space is useful when you want to share your family photos with your spouse/children, where you don't want to share things album by album. Maybe you can achieve similar stuff though your personal albums, but it looks less straightforward to my newbie self

[@JulieFrame]

I have an existing photo file structure on my nas. Do I have to really move it over to the home/photo sharepoint? Or is there an easy way for Synology photo to point to my already existing file structure and crawl that?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

If you want to use the built-in Synology features for personal/shared space, I'm afraid that's the only way that I know how 😞

[@Dominik-gt7oy]

Great video, helped me to understand. Thank you

[@RafMatthyssen]

Didn't they bring back subject recognition last summer? I'm still on Moments because it was lacking but since DSM 6 won't be supported come September, I won't have a choice but to move to Photos.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Yes, it's back!

[@kushagranalwaya]

Can I restrict storage limit for a user?

[@ThomasS17]

I recently set up my new NAS, and I created a shared folder for every family member. Later I realized that drive and photos use the users home folder by default. Would you recommend, or is it "best practice" to use the individual home folders as the "root" directory for each member, or to create new shared folders for everyone like I did?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I wouldn't say that either option is right or wrong. I personally use the home folder structure, but I know that some people prefer individual shared folders.

[@ericderosaphotographyvideo398]

Great, detailed video, thank you !

[@tomgrey3046]

Thx for the practical insight and summary. As of my experience with Moments, when shared space is enabled and photos shared, files are duplicated and stored on home/drive/moments and /photos/moments (I suppose movies as well which could be a significant impact on storage space). homes/users/drive/moments files seemed to be linked to home/drive/.. files (according to file properties - file path). Could you advise how this shared file storage is managed in Photos/DSM 7? If I share my photos with others, will these files be duplicated in /photo album or the permission is assigned to a folder only? There was yet another folder created when mobile devices were synced with Moments, and this was yet another storage place. Prior to DSM update/Moments to Photos migration, I just like to make sure if it makes sense or brings improvements to storage logic. I like to share my photos with all family members on their own credentials, but I do not need libraries to be physically duplicated and fragmented over multiple storage locations. And last another question, does geolocation works with Map view, like it was in Photo Station?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I will be honest in saying that I didn't ever really look at the folder structure when I was using moments so I'm not entirely sure how it used to work and how it currently works. Photos should NOT be duplicated, but since I am not sure how the folder structures were on Moments, I am not comfortable advising. It might be worth it to ask Synology support since this seems like an important thing for you. Unfortunately, no to the maps :( Hoping that it's updated in the future!

[@tomgrey3046]

@@WunderTechTutorials Thanks for your answer.

[@UK_Adventurer]

I hope Synology examine the lack of features in their photo program and rectifies it; especially as some have been taken off ... Its a shame that the App doesn't give the option when uploading to the NAS to be categorized like Microsoft photo app used to do!

[@wfp9378]

This is the ONE and ONLY app I feel has tarnished Synology.The old DS PHOTO app, and the "Moments" app, were both superior to this difficult to use mess. its the only reason why my DS1819+ is still on DSM 6.2. I have a DS920+ running DSM 7.x using this "Photos" app and its a mess. Sadly Synology have ignored the complaints on the forums, direct emails and my requests during their online teaching/marketing sessions. Others have also asked the to "please fix" during these sessions, but the Taiwan team hosting these simply say "thank you" and nothing happens. Been a fanboy of theirs since 2011... but this app really hurts them

[@darcyduncantech]

Which model are you running this demo on?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I am running it in a virtual machine on my NAS, but these are the requirements: www.synology.com/en-us/dsm/7.1/software_spec/synology_photos

[@mrzatansafe]

Synology Photos Can't find some words. For example, rtf36310t wants to search for 36310. The result is not found.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

That's interesting - are you talking about file name or metadata?

[@mrzatansafe]

@@WunderTechTutorialsFile name

[@WunderTechTutorials]

@@mrzatansafe Yes, that's unfortunately a limitation of Synology Photos right now. Hopefully they fix it in the future.

[@ardentdfender4116]

At around 5:18 your explaining about the Shared Space. That Shared a space and not the personal space. I haven’t for the life of me figured hoe exactly you put any photos there. I can create a folder as that’s explanatory. But in nothing I’ve been able to do can I figure how exactly you move any photos there. Great tutorial. Wish their was a way to disregard some people in pictures. As many can be created when you take picture of a crowd.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

The Shared Space (to me) was created to replace Synology Photo Station in DSM 6. Photo Station used the "photo" folder and Synology Photos uses that as well. Basically, anything that's in the "photo" folder will show in the Shared Space.

[@ardentdfender4116]

@@WunderTechTutorials i have photos in my photo folder, lots I’ve uploaded. However, in the shared space their isn’t anything. I can make a new folder yes. But on trying to figure out how to actually add a photo to that shared space or folder, that I can’t figure out. No amount of click on this, that, right clicking on anything I can think of has yielded any answer of how thats done in adding a single photo to anything into this particular shared space area.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

@@ardentdfender4116 When you say photos folder, do you mean on the actual "photo" folder, or the "photos" folder inside the user account? If there are files in the "photo" folder, can you try and re-index inside of Synology Photos?

[@Trollzzofficial]

Personally I'm missing even feature like guests able to add pictures into shared album with them. Is it that big of a safety hazard to make a link which you can use to add pictures to that one album? That is something amazing about Google Photos that you can just share it with someone who has no idea what Google Photos is and it will be fine, they can upload. Also searching for context or have my dog as a "person" recognized is just very nice to have, personally.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

You can, but you will have to expose your NAS or use something like QuickConnect. Overall, not as clean of a solution as Google Photos is.

[@ahmedaborady7883]

Is there yet any solution for the super slow thumbnail for photo and video conversion when you copy large number of file via SMB?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Not that I know of, unfortunately.

[@utiniposungu1221]

Great video, thank you! 👍👍👍

[@emersoncardenas]

one question... if you can in synology photos modify the exif data? for example if i have a picture without exif data y can put a date to that picture and it write it in the exif data with synology photos and save it in the jpg?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

You can write the metadata, but I'm not sure if it updates the EXIF data. There's a good chance that it just updates the Synology Photos database.

[@playingsaint]

I want to use Synology photo’s, but you can’t do much creative with it; for the moment I mainly use the photo’s app of iOS and Mac OS and use their 50 Gb storage. Once this is full I transfer that part to a bigger folder on my Nas where I keep the edited photo’s in a map of photo’s. How can I change all that to a system where I use Synology photo’s and have the possibility to work in photo’s Mac and affinity photo. (This I sometime use to make more advanced edits;

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I don't use Mac's, so I unfortunately don't have many suggestions. If there's a way to get the photos from your phone to a folder on your NAS automatically (could be Synology Photos), that is probably going to be your best bet.

[@DjLundbladh]

IS this going to duplicate all my photos or make extra thumbnail pic files? :) *subbed*

[@WunderTechTutorials]

It should only read the information that's there, so no.

[@gregoryc5989]

Have you experienced issues with uploading your google photos? I just purchased a DS720+ and I downloaded my photos from google twice but I noticed duplicates and a bunch of files that's not recognizable. I've been fighting this issue for the past couple of days, any help would be appreciated. thank you

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I have and it's unfortunately the way that Google exports the library. There are a few tools you can use to try and merge them, but a lot of it is a manual cleanup unfortunately.

[@justinbrowns1945]

Great Video, thanks for sharing. Any ideas why I don't see personal photos. O have a Photos directory in my user's account. All they see is shared photos and it is not even labeled that way. It pretty much just says synology photos when in teh app.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Thanks! Are the files stored in the "photo" folder or in the individual users home folder?

[@justinbrowns1945]

@@WunderTechTutorials Photos Folder of the users Home folder

[@WunderTechTutorials]

@@justinbrowns1945 You should see them in the personal space if they're inside of the users home directory. Have you tried to reindex from Synology Photos?

[@kevinhughes9801]

Great video thank you

[@McBenac]

I'm certainly not an expert in using the Synology, but I needed to backup my hard drive on my stationary computer so I got a DS918+ and use the Drive Client to automatically sync this HD to the NAS (/volume1/HD). In one of the folders on this HD I have a folder with all my photos and video clips. This folder is 5TB. How can I add them to Synology Photo? So I'd like to add one of the folders on the NAS. Like /volume1/HD/PhotosVideos. I don't want to upload them all once again to the Synology NAS.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

The only way I know to do it would be to move the folder on the NAS into either your individual home folder (personal space) or in the photo folder (shared space). I don't think you can map photos to somewhere else.

[@darkangelo]

When you delete a photo from your iphone does it remove it from synology photos on your nas?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

I believe that it will, but I haven't tested it. If you can, it is definitely best to create a test photo on the app and delete it and see if it deletes from the cloud version.

[@darkangelo]

@@WunderTechTutorials just tested it and it does not. This is probably a good thing. It does have a clean up space on your device option in settings. I think this essentially deletes photos from your phone that you have already backed up

[@WunderTechTutorials]

@@darkangelo Glad you were able to test it! Totally agree on both points!

[@halilnevzat]

OMG what a shame to not support manual face tagging , and subject ai recognition should be there also. my favourite thing on google photos is when i search for army it shows up my photos from army related, when i search for antalya (which is a city in Türkiye) it shows up pictures from there. so basically its auto recognizes the content of photo, where it shooted, and with who. these are "must" features that synology should get. until then i'll be waiting.

[@rafalcisek]

I could not agree more. Its not even close to big data power. And it does not work with videos which is crucial for me.

[@MaM44341]

Unfortunately, I cannot see Synology Photos in the Android TV store, and also for Samsung TV or Apple TV, while for the DSM6 version there are both DS photo and DS video available. This is big downside which is keeping me from upgrading because I often show my photos and videos to my friends on TV.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Yes, that is unfortunately one of the limitations right now 😞

[@mitol2698]

Very educational video. I noticed there's no way to organize the pictures in a specific order within a shared folder besides time. Is that correct?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Thanks! You can organize them any way that you'd like, but if you upload them inside of Synology Photos, it will automatically categorize them by date.

[@mls1871]

The facial recognition in the shared space is not properly working, whereas in the personal space it does. I get the message “The people mentioned in Synology Moments will be migrated ASAP, please be patient.” I have been waiting for couple of weeks now, do you have any clue? Re-indexing?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

If it's been a couple of weeks, that sounds like a problem. Have you considered contacting Synology support? It wouldn't hurt to re-index, but I'm not sure that will fix it.

[@mls1871]

@@WunderTechTutorials Just before I wanted to try re-index or contacting synology, all of a sudden the facial recognition started working, this literally took 4 weeks for syncing of about 100 Gb. Quite strange, but now it works 👍.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

@@mls1871 Definitely strange, but glad it's working!

[@charlieanddad2]

Hi, thanks great video. I'm still on DSM6 with a DS212. I do not use DS photo or Moments but if I get a new NAS it will certainly be high end aiming at using Synology Photos, probably a 720+ although the 6GB limit annoys me with VMs in mind. Anyway, I also recently moved all photos for each user back to their home area as this makes it only one share to explain to family members. I just called it photo inside each home. My question, do I need to rename that to Photos. I have a year and month structure under photo for each home also? Thanks.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

When you migrated it to their home folder, did you do it through Synology Moments or you created your own folder structure? If you created your own, you might be better off moving in into a temporary directory, upgrading to DSM 7 and then moving the folder back in so that the folder structure stays the same.

[@cezarvancea]

What a pity, no image search recognition by key words (dog.. watch.. beige.. green.. cat..). It's definitely a missing functionality which could make a difference between opting for google photos in favor.. :so sad (

[@apos02]

I'm unable to sign into the Synology Photos android app. I didn't have this issue with the previous app prior to the DSM 7 update

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Are you using the DSM or Photos port?

[@apos02]

@@WunderTechTutorials I know I'm using ports 5000 and 5001, I haven't changed the default ports. When I log in on the app am I supposed to enter a port number?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

@@apos02 Yes, you would put the IP address with a colon : and then the port YOUR_NAS_IP:5001

[@apos02]

@@WunderTechTutorials I'm finally in! What an ordeal. Thanks so much for your help

[@apos02]

Ok so it seems like I'm only able to log in when I'm on Wi-Fi. This is really weird

[@harpersneil]

I'm concerned... I run a DS920+, it's my second Synology NAS; I'm a huge fan. My DSM920+ is connected to my Sony X950G via Cat6 ethernet - this is an Android TV onto which I've installed DS Photo. While not perfect, this set up for me is excellent! I'm streaming highbit rate video and it works flawlessly. However, Synology is not building an Android TV version of Synology Photos meaning that I'll have to 'cast' all my footage to my TV from now on?? I'm assuming it'll be smart enough to transfer this data over Ethernet rather than wirelessly, but I've not got to do everything off my phone? I can't just pick up my Remote and do it? What I liked about that set up is that is was so simple, anyone could do it. I created a User that logged in automatically, only had access to the photos that I wanted to share with my family and friends - it was perfect. Am I missing something or is this all dead now?

[@WunderTechTutorials]

As of right now, I think you have it right. I'm sure there are other ways to try and display the photos on a TV (using the files directly, not going through Synology Photos), but it's not going to be a Synology application.

[@harpersneil]

@@WunderTechTutorials Thanks so much for getting back to me. I had the same thought you had, but after a quick search, I didn't have much luck finding anything that could do the same that worked nearly as well - shame. However, I have to give credit where due and the cast functionality works extremely well. Again, it's not exactly what I wanted, I would have preferred a dedicated app, but they've executed the cast function very well and the files are clearly being pulled over Ethernet rather than wirelessly. Bizarrely however, when I try to play videos on my phone from the NAS, the playback is really poor... weird. Thanks for the excellent upload friend - really great stuff. Subbed.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

@@harpersneil Thanks so much! Glad that you have some sort of a workaround.

[@charlieanddad2]

I spent lots of time working out how to stream years of photos and videos from NAS to TV and nothing really worked as well as I wanted on my fairly old DS212. In the end I admitted defeat and I now do a bulk copy onto a usb3 HDD from the NAS and physically plug it in to an xbox on the TV. Apparently when you pay lots of money for a synology it covers the cost of all their great software. Hmmmm.

[@harpersneil]

@@charlieanddad2 Respectfully... "fairly old"?? I wouldn't say a 9 year old computer was fairly old, I say it was almost landfill. That said, I'm surprised you couldn't get a reasonably good solution with that hardware - even though that is a very low spec NAS. My DS414 performed admirably; I only upgraded when I started using it as an NVR for my surveillance system. Mind me asking what you tried? Maybe we can work out a solution for you?

[@raylopez99]

I've not gotten "Shared Space" in Synology Photos DSM 7 to work unless the user is an Administrator. Anybody else have this problem? Not a big deal since for our home it's not critical that there be a separation between Administrators and ordinary Users. But in a corporation it might be more important.

[@raylopez99]

I agree with the author @10:21, that Shared Space is not necessary and is confusing.

[@raylopez99]

BTW, I use both Google Photos (and pay for it every month) and Synology NAS. I use both and see no need to switch just to Synology NAS.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Is it enabled? That's the only time I've seen it not display properly.

[@rafalcisek]

What about facial recognition in videos. On high end qnaps still there's no support for AI object recognition on videos, including face recognition. For me thie is cricial and the main reason why I cannot ged rid of google service. On GF it's so perfect that AI objects tagging works also on any video. How about synology? I'm concidering buing another stong power nas, having already two high configured qnaps (one with QTS one with hero). There is still no support for videos implemented in AI engine (which is used in Qsirch, Qmaggie, video statione, etc). So do not tell me that's co perfect solution. I wish it was.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Synology Photos is not good in terms of facial recognition. I wish I could say otherwise, but Google Photos is light-years ahead.

[@RevuitNet]

I really don’t understand this lack of automatic backup in iOS…. It works for Google Photos, OneDrive, Dropbox etc…. Why can’t Synology get their shit together and get this working… this is literally a core feature and without it the app is useless.

[@HonStuartK]

I have just uploaded a few dozen photos to test Synology Photos ("SP) in DSM 7, and I found that there were a significant number of photos it did not recognize that there was a face in the picture, and there was no way for me to manually show SP where the face was and whose face it was. BTW, I uploaded the photos to Synology and they confirmed that SP wasn't recognizing there was a face in the photo, even though it was very obvious to us there was. So face recognition has a long way to go, and I hope they do improve it. I also wish we could have nested folders. For example, I would like to create a folder for the Smith family and then a sub-folder for each family member like Bob and Mary, etc. That would let me just drag and drop them into the sub-folder instead of having to go through each one and add a Smith tag and a person tag (like Bob or Mary, etc.). I also wish there was some direct way I could upload my Mac Photos library and have the pictures automatically go into SP instead of having to export them and then upload them to SP. I also wish there was a Mac Photos app, like there is a mobile app. Finally, I would wish we could edit the SP photos.

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Agreed! The facial recognition in Synology Photos is poor - especially when comparing it to something like Google Photos. You can merge "people" albums (I don't remember how exactly off the top of my head), but it still isn't the best.

[@x3merx3mer]

Why is nobody complaining about videos!? You can't play them in the android app! It throws you out and plays it in a web browser!

[@WunderTechTutorials]

Do you have a default video player set? I didn't like that about the app either, but it started to play in my video player (after I set one) and it was a slightly better experience.

[@DiogoReis]

Worse than that, can't play videos outside of the synology network, really disappointed with the app being so limited...

[@hugolinprsnickus]

@@DiogoReis you mean if I share a video, people outside will not be able to play it?

[@DiogoReis]

@Leo Gal sharing is different, what I'm facing is that I can't play my own videos from photos app outside the network where the synology is...

[@x3merx3mer]

@@WunderTechTutorials I installed VLC player and it took over, now it plays inside VLC. ..but still, how hard is it to implement a video player into an app 😒

[@RevuitNet]

I literally have to backup to google photos currently and migrate photos due to the limitation of having to keep app open…. Sort your lives out Synology, it’s not nearly good enough,

[@JimJohn5555]

Yeah but you cannot edit your photos in Synology.