The Photos app lets you create shared albums that other people can contribute to. The process involves a few steps, but it’s not difficult. You can start by figuring out which images and videos you want to share, or you can create the album and then add to it.
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Invitees receive alerts on their devices and email to their iCloud account.
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With no items selected, you create an empty shared album: in macOS, hover over the Shared Albums label in the sidebar and click the plus sign; in iOS/iPadOS, tap the Shared Albums view and tap Create. In all versions of Photos, follow steps 4 and 5 above.
Once a shared album is created, you can add media to it:
Remove media from a shared album by first viewing the album, following one of the options below, and confirming the deletion:
Change what’s shared by removing media.
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To change who has access to the album, first view the album, and then click the Shared Album Details icon in macOS (a person’s outline in a circle at the upper-right of the toolbar) or tap the More (…) icon in iOS/iPadOS and choose Shared Album Details. From here, you can change options for who can add photos, add and remove people, change notifications, and make the shared album available publicly on the internet. In macOS, changes take effect as you make them; in iOS/iPadOS, tap Done when complete.
You can delete the entire shared album by choosing Delete Shared Album (macOS) or Delete Album in the same locations as modifying details. However, be warned! You cannot restore a deleted shared album: all the media shared by others will be removed from your devices, and all the media you shared will be deleted from all the devices of people with whom the album was shared. The original media you and others shared from Photos remains intact on your and other people’s libraries—it’s just no longer copied to other people’s.
This Mac 911 article is in response to a question submitted by Macworld reader Lynn.
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