How to Access iCloud on iPad or iPhone

• How to Set Up iCloud on iPad or iPhone
• How to Access iCloud Photos on iPad or iPhone
• How to Access iCloud Drive on iPad or iPhone
• Why Can't See My iCloud Contents from My iPad?
• Conclusion

How to Set Up iCloud on iPad or iPhone

Before accessing iCloud features on your iPad or iPhone, the first step is logging in to your iCloud on your device.

Step 1. Open "Settings" on your device.

Step 2. Click on "Apple Account" at the top of the page.

Step 3. Choose a way to log in to your account. You can choose to use another Apple device, enter the account and password, or create a new account to log in.

After logging in to your iCloud account, you can see multiple iCloud features, such as iCloud Photos, iCloud Drive, Passwords and Keychain, Notes, Messages in iCloud, Health, iCloud Calendar, Contacts, Reminders, etc. If you want to enable a feature, just switch on the button next to it.

How to Access iCloud Photos on iPad or iPhone

Unlike other iCloud features that have simple functions, iCloud Photos is more complex. Thus, it will be shown individually. In this section, you can see how to enable iCloud Photos on an iPad or iPhone and how to access iCloud Photos on your device.

How to Enable iCloud Photos

Step 1. Go to "Settings" on your device.

Step 2. Click on your Apple ID and enter "iCloud".

Step 3. Choose "Photos" and switch on the button next to "Sync this iPhone/iPad".

Step 4. Choose to "Optimize iPhone/iPad Storage" or "Download and Keep Originals".

• Optimize iPhone/iPad Storage: Save all the full-resolution photos to iCloud and only keep the compressed ones on your device. This feature helps save your device storage.
• Download and Keep Originals: Save all the original quality of photos on your device.

Step 5. Set up “Shared Library” and then you can add participants to this library, enable “Shared Library Suggestions”, and “Sharing from Camera”.

Step 6. Choose to turn on "Shared Albums" or not.

Notes:✎Differences between "Shared Library" and "Shared Albums"

Participants in the Shared Library can add, edit, and delete photos, while in the Shared Albums, they can only add.

Participants can add as many photos and videos as they want to the Shared Library when the owner has enough iCloud storage. However, the Shared Albums only allows adding 5,000 photos and videos to a single album.

You can enable the Shared Library to automatically save photos or videos from the Camera. However, you have to manually add items to the Shared Albums.

How to Access iCloud Photos

When you enable iCloud Photos on your device, photos will be automatically uploaded to iCloud from your device. So, how to access photos from on iCloud on iPad or iPhone? Just open the Photos app. Photos on this app are those on iCloud.

► If you want to access the Shared Library: Go to the Photos app > click on your account icon > choose “Shared Library”.

► If you want to access the Shared Albums, scroll down the page on Photos, and then you can see the “Shared Albums” section.

★Tips: To check the iCloud Photos sync status, there are some marks and icons you need to know:

Yellow badge: iCloud syncing is paused. You can click your account icon and resume syncing manually.

Yellow warning icon: Your iCloud storage is almost full.

Red exclamation mark: Your iCloud storage is full.

Blue badge: You have notifications from a shared library or shared album.

Partially filled blue circle around your account icon: Photos are actively uploading to iCloud.

Partially filled gray outline around your account icon: Uploads are paused. You can also click your account icon to resume syncing.

How to Access iCloud Drive on iPad or iPhone

iCloud Drive is also one of the main features of iCloud that many users are in favor of. It is quite special because it does not have an individual app called "iCloud Drive", and that is the reason why some users have the "Where is iCloud Drive on iPad?" confusion. However, it is located in the Files app.

How to Enable iCloud Drive

Step 1. Go to the Settings app on your iPad or iPhone.

Step 2. Click on your Apple ID and choose “iCloud”.

Step 3. Select "iCloud Drive" and switch on the button of "Sync this iPad/iPhone".

Step 4. Choose the apps syncing to iCloud Drive, including Pages, Numbers, GarageBand, iMovie, and Clips.

How to Access iCloud Drive

Step 1. Open the Files app on your device.

Step 2. Go to the "Browse" section.

Step 3. Choose iCloud Drive and you can see all the files syncing to iCloud Drive.

Why Can't See My iCloud Contents from My iPad?

It is possible that you cannot find your iCloud contents on your iPad, iPhone, or other Apple devices. There are some probable reasons you can use to check and fix your problem.

Conclusion

In this post, you can see how to access iCloud on iPad or iPhone along with the steps for setting up iCloud features like iCloud Photos and iCloud Drive on your device. Follow the steps and use iCloud Photos and iCloud Drive without confusion now!

Besides, if you also have other cloud accounts like Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, pCloud, SharePoint, MEGA, and Amazon S3, you can connect these clouds with MultCloud. It is a free online cloud manager that can automate the transfer/sync/backup process between iCloud and Google Drive or other clouds without downloading and uploading.