Late last year, Google announced that it would end unlimited storage for its Google Photos service. The deadline for the end of unlimited free storage is fast approaching, scheduled for June 1.

This means that there is approximately two weeks to go before Google's new policy goes into effect. Here are all the reminders about storage options and the extra bits you might need to know.

When backing up snaps to the cloud, you now have two options: high quality and original quality. High quality photos will be compressed to a size of 16 MB or less when uploaded to the cloud, while original photos will not be compressed and will remain at the resolution at which they were originally taken.

Currently, Google Photos allows unlimited cloud storage of high quality photos and unlimited videos up to 16 MP and 1080p resolution. This means that if you are an avid photographer, you can upload as many images and videos as you like to Google's trusted backup service, as long as you don't mind the loss of image quality.

So what's changing: after June 1, new photos and videos uploaded to Google Photos will count toward the 15GB of free storage that comes with your Google account, regardless of whether they are "high quality" or "original." In November 2020, Google Photos' leader David Rabe explained the reasoning behind the move, arguing that free backups were too costly for the company.

If you exceed this 15 GB limit after June 1, you must sign up for Google One and purchase additional storage or risk Google deleting your photos. It is worth remembering that Google's 15GB of free account storage is split between Photos, Drive, and Gmail, so if you have a lot of large email attachments or PDF files on your Drive, those will count too.

The good news is that existing high-quality photos will not contribute to the free 15GB limit. In other words, anything uploaded in that quality before the June 1 deadline will be treated as non-existent from a storage perspective.

However, the same does not apply to "original" quality images, which already consume storage space, so if you already have, say, 14 GB worth of original quality images, you will not have much space left to upload new photos on June 1.

You may be wondering what options you have once your storage limit reaches 15GB. And if you decide to stick with Google, you will need one of the Google One plans. So how much do these plans cost?

Google One's 100GB plan costs $1.99 per month or $19.99 per year; the 200GB storage plan costs $2.99 per month or $29.99 per year. Power users can also opt for the 2TB plan, which is significantly more expensive at $9.99 per month or $99.99 per year.

These plans should provide a sufficient amount of storage for regular users, but other options are also available.

If you own a Pixel 2-5, you are in the fortunate position of still having access to free unlimited storage for high quality uploads after the June 1 deadline.

Even better, if you own and use an original Pixel (not very likely since it is now 5 years old, but we suspect there are still some out there), you can upload unlimited uploads in original image quality.

More: the best Google Photos alternative [27].