iCloud Drive is part of iCloud. Save photos, documents, app data, and much more to your iCloud Drive repository, and then access those files on all your devices, similarly to services like Dropbox. With iCloud and iCloud Drive, it’s easy to save files from your Mac and then access them from your iPhone, iPad, or iCloud.com. Here’s a look at setting up iCloud Drive and saving files from your Mac desktop.
Set up iCloud Drive
If you haven’t yet set up iCloud Drive, the process is quick and easy. You’ll need to enable iCloud Drive on all your iOS devices, such as your iPhone and iPad, as well as your Mac.
On Your iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch
On Your Mac
Using Files With iCloud Drive
After you set up iCloud Drive and enable it across all your devices, any documents you already have stored in iCloud are automatically moved to iCloud Drive. On your iOS devices, such as your iPhone and iPad, you’ll see your files in the Files app as well as the Pages, Numbers, and Keynote apps. By default, iCloud Drive has folders for each of your Apple iWork apps (Keynote, Pages, and Numbers), as well as folders for Automator, Preview, QuickTime Player, Script Editor, and TextEdit. Add your own folders, as well, and store whatever documents you want. (More on this below.) How you store documents and other files in iCloud Drive depends on what OS X or macOS version you have. For macOS Sierra and above, it’s effortless. Just enable the Desktop and Documents folders to automatically sync with iCloud Drive. For earlier OS X or macOS versions, you’ll need to manually move desktop files and documents to iCloud Drive.
Save Files to iCloud Drive With Sierra and Later
Starting with macOS Sierra, you have the ability to store your Desktop and Documents folder in iCloud Drive and access them on all your devices. For example, begin a document on your Mac desktop, then work on it later from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch and on iCloud.com. Everything automatically stays up to date everywhere. To add your Desktop and Documents folder to iCloud Drive:
Save Files to iCloud Drive With Earlier OS Versions
With earlier OS X and macOS versions, you don’t have the ability to enable your Desktop and Documents folders to save to iCloud Drive. You can, however, manually create folders on iCloud Drive and move or copy your files there so you can access them on your iOS devices or iCloud.com.
Save Files to iCloud Drive When Saving a Document
An easy way to save a copy of your file to iCloud Drive is when you save a new document. To copy the file or files, hold down the Option key and drag the file or files to the iCloud Drive tab on the top of the Finder Window.
