Move Google Photos to Synology Photos or an External Drive

By Josep Mampel Marques, updated November 11, 2026

To move Google Photos to a Synology NAS or an external drive, export the library with Google Takeout, fix the dates and locations that Takeout leaves in .json files, and copy the result to the destination. On Synology, put the photos in /home/Photos (your Personal Space) or /photo (the Shared Space) and Synology Photos shows them. PhotoFixer does the fixing in your browser and returns a zip ready to unpack onto the NAS or the drive.

Step 1: export and fix

1. Request a Takeout export with only Google Photos, zip format and the largest archive size. Details in how to download Google Photos with Takeout.
2. Download every part. Each archive expires in about 7 days and can be downloaded 5 times.
3. Open PhotoFixer and choose all the zip parts at once. Do not unzip them first.
4. Pick the time zone where most photos were taken.
5. Pick the folder layout. "By year and month" gives a tidy 2019/07/ structure that works well in a file browser. "Keep Takeout albums" keeps Google's album and year folders.
6. Press Fix my photos. In Chrome and Edge the result is written straight to your disk, so large libraries work. Other browsers build it in memory, which is fine for a few gigabytes.

Why this matters for a NAS or a drive: file browsers and many tools sort by the file's modified date, and after a Takeout every file carries the export date. PhotoFixer sets every file's date to its capture time and writes the date, location and description into JPEGs that have no EXIF. Videos get their creation date. More in why Takeout dates are wrong.

Step 2a: Synology Photos

1. Enable the user home service if you want the photos in your Personal Space. Synology's help gives the path: DSM Control Panel > User & Group > Advanced > User Home, then tick Enable user home service. This creates /home/Photos for each Synology Photos user.
2. Choose Personal or Shared Space. Personal Space lives in /home/Photos; the Shared Space uses the shared folder /photo. For the Shared Space, File Station access is set separately under DSM Control Panel > Shared Folder.
3. Unzip the PhotoFixer result and copy the folders into the chosen location with File Station or another file sharing protocol, such as a network share from your computer.
4. Let Synology Photos index the files. Large libraries take a while. Folder View shows the folders as you copied them.
5. Do not rename the Photos folder. Synology warns that if the folder is renamed in File Station or over other protocols, the photos are no longer accessible until it is renamed back and re-indexed.

Keep copies outside the Synology Photos folders until indexing finishes and you have checked a sample, especially screenshots, scans and videos.

Step 2b: an external drive

1. Make sure the drive has room for the whole library plus some margin. The PhotoFixer result is about the size of your media; the .json files are not copied into it.
2. Unzip the result directly onto the drive, or onto your computer and then copy it over.
3. Open a few folders and sort by date modified: files should now show the day each photo was taken, not the export day.
4. Keep the original Takeout zips somewhere else until you are sure the copy is complete.

A drive is a backup, not a photo app. If you later add Synology Photos, Immich or iCloud, the fixed files import with their dates in place.

Albums and duplicates

In a Takeout, a photo that belongs to an album can appear both in a year folder and in each album folder; GooglePhotosTakeoutHelper's documentation describes album-only photos and album copies. With "By year and month", PhotoFixer keeps one copy per output file name in each month and reports how many album copies it skipped. With "Keep Takeout albums", every album folder keeps its copy, so the same photo can appear more than once. See Takeout duplicates and album folders explained.

Alternatives

• GooglePhotosTakeoutHelper organizes a Takeout on your computer with several album modes and writes metadata (non-JPEG formats need ExifTool). A good choice if you are comfortable running a program.
• Unzip and copy as is. It works, but photos without EXIF will sort by the export date and locations added in Google Photos stay in the .json files.

Other destinations that follow the same fix-then-upload pattern: OneDrive, Dropbox and Amazon Photos.