User Guide

Everything you need to get started with the Lightroom Google Photos Plugin.

1. Installation

After purchasing, you'll receive an email with a download link and license key.

Download & unzip the google-photos-plugin.zip file. You'll get a folder called google-photos.lrplugin.
Move the folder to a permanent location on your computer. A good spot on macOS is ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Lightroom/Modules/ and on Windows %AppData%\Adobe\Lightroom\Modules\.
Open Lightroom Classic and go to File > Plug-in Manager.
Click Add and select the google-photos.lrplugin folder.
The plugin should appear in the list with a green "Installed and running" status.

2. Activate Your License

In the Plug-in Manager, select "Google Photos" from the list on the left. You'll see the Publish Service settings.

Paste your license key (from your purchase email) into the License field.
Click Activate. You should see a green "Licensed" status.
Your license works on one computer at a time. To switch machines, click Deactivate on the old computer first, then activate on the new one.

3. Connect Your Google Account

Still in the Publish Service settings:

Click Connect to Google Photos.
A browser window will open asking you to sign in to your Google account and grant permission.
After authorizing, you'll see "Connected as yourname@gmail.com" in Lightroom.
Click Save to finish setup.

4. Creating Albums

Albums in Google Photos are managed through Published Collections in Lightroom.

In the Library module, find the Publish Services panel on the left sidebar.
Right-click on Google Photos and select Create Published Collection.
Give it a name — this will become the album name in Google Photos.
The album is automatically created in your Google Photos account.

5. Publishing Photos

Drag photos from your library into the Published Collection you created.
The photos will appear in the "New Photos to Publish" section.
Click the Publish button at the bottom of the panel.
A progress bar will show the upload status. Once complete, the photos appear in your Google Photos album.

6. Editing & Re-publishing

When you edit a photo that's already been published:

Lightroom automatically marks it as "Modified Photos to Re-Publish".
Click Publish again to upload the updated version.
The new version replaces the old one in your Google Photos album — no duplicates.
The old version is moved to a "To Delete (Lightroom Plugin)" album in Google Photos so you can review and manually delete it.

7. Removing Photos

To remove a photo from a Google Photos album:

Right-click the photo in the Published Collection and select Remove from Published Collection.
Click Publish to sync the change.
The photo is removed from the album and moved to the "To Delete (Lightroom Plugin)" album.

Why can't the plugin delete photos directly? Google's Photos API does not allow third-party apps to delete photos from a user's library. The "To Delete" album makes it easy to find and delete them manually in Google Photos.

8. Renaming & Deleting Albums

Rename: Right-click the Published Collection and choose Rename. The album name in Google Photos is updated automatically.
Delete: Right-click the Published Collection and choose Delete. This removes the collection from Lightroom, but the album remains in Google Photos (the API does not support album deletion).

9. Troubleshooting

If something isn't working as expected:

Check Lightroom logs: Go to ~/Library/Logs/Lightroom/ on macOS or %AppData%\Adobe\Lightroom\Logs\ on Windows. Look for lines containing "GooglePhotos" or "GPhotos".
Authentication issues: Try disconnecting and reconnecting your Google account in the Publish Service settings.
Upload failures: Large files use resumable uploads automatically. If an upload fails, try publishing again — the plugin retries with exponential backoff.
"License already activated": Your key can only be active on one computer. Deactivate on the old machine first, or contact support to reset your activation.
Still stuck? Use the contact form — I respond personally to every message.