Your photos are priceless—they hold memories of family vacations, birthdays, and everyday moments you never want to forget. But what happens if your phone gets lost, your computer crashes, or a cloud storage service fails? Without a solid backup strategy, those memories could be gone forever.

That’s where the 3-2-1 backup rule comes in. This simple yet powerful best practice ensures your photos are safe no matter what. Let’s break it down.

what is the 3-2-1 rule to backup photos?

The 3-2-1 backup strategy means you should have:

• 3 copies of your photos
• 2 different types of media (ex: external drive + cloud storage)
• 1 copy stored offsite (ex: in the cloud or a separate location)

Following this method helps protect your photos from accidental deletion, hardware failure, and even disasters like fires or theft.

how to set up a 3-2-1 backup for your photos

1: Create Your Photo Hub

This is the step most people miss, but it’s the critical foundation for your photo backup.

Begin by gathering ALL your photos into one place- your “digital photo hub.” For Mac users, Apple Photos is my favorite hub. For PC users, I like to use a simple year/month folder structure on an external hard drive.

This hub counts as your first copy. After this is complete, you can create two additional backups. This ensures you have multiple recovery options if something goes wrong.

2: Create a Backup Copy of Your Photo Hub

I like for this copy to be cloud-based. It’s important to diversify your backup locations to minimize risk. So if your photo hub exists on your computer or an external hard drive, a cloud-based copy will protect you from physical on-site risks like fire, flood or theft.

Additionally a cloud-based copy of your library allows access from anywhere and includes lots of amazing features like facial recognition and keyword search that make interacting with your photos much more fun.

For Mac users, my favorite cloud service is iCloud. For PC users I recommend Google Photos or Amazon Photos. The search features in Google are much better than Amazon, but Amazon includes unlimited photo storage with prime membership so that’s a popular option for people trying to save money on cloud services.

3: Create a Third Copy of Your Photo Hub

I recommend paying for two cloud services, not more. So at this step, upload your photo hub to another cloud service. Backblaze is an automated service that backs up your entire computer (and attached external hard drives) to the cloud.

If your budget doesn’t allow paying for two cloud services, you can make your third copy an external hard drive. Copy and paste the hub you created in Step 1 – that’s it! I recommend labeling this drive clearly as BACKUP with the date it was last updated. If you would like to automate this copy, you can use Time Machine on Mac or pay for software like GoodSync.

If you did not use any cloud-based storage in your 3-2-1 setup, then you’ll want to make sure one of your external hard drive copies is stored offsite- at an office or a family member’s house- so you’re not vulnerable in the case of theft, fire or flood.

my recommended 3-2-1 setup to backup photos

The 3-2-1 setup I recommend for Mac users is iCloud, Amazon Photos and an external hard drive.

The 3-2-1 setup I recommend for PC users is an external hard drive, Google Photos and Amazon Photos.

why the 3-2-1 backup rule works

Unlike relying on a single cloud service or one external hard drive, this method ensures you always have multiple ways to recover your photos. It protects against: accidental deletion, hard drive failures, cloud service outages, and theft or disasters.

I know three copies feels like a lot, but here’s a personal example just to highlight the importance of 3-2-1 backup. Several years ago, before I got certified as a Professional Photo Organizer, I had an external hard drive and I paid for a cloud service to backup that drive automatically. After a cross country move I plugged in my hard drive and discovered it did not work. I didn’t panic because I knew I could retrieve those items from the cloud backup. Imagine my panic when I logged into that cloud service and discovered it hadn’t updated in more than a year. When I reached out for support they said it was a fluke malfunction and there was nothing they could do. I ended up spending $$$$$ to have that hard drive recovered and I was NOT happy about it. Wasn’t the cloud supposed to prevent exactly that? If I’d have followed the 3-2-1 backup method, I would have had a third copy to save me. Trust me, 3-2-1 backup is the way to go!

get started!

If your photos aren’t backed up using the 3-2-1 rule yet, now is the time to start! My Backup Bootcamp course provides step-by-step guidance on organizing and properly backing up your photos, with video tutorials for both Mac and PC users!

Prefer to hire the Miss Freddy Team to setup a 3-2-1 backup system FOR you? Learn more about our Digital Organizing Services!