A common frustration I’ve noticed amongst fellow travellers lately is the question of how to backup travel photos without a computer.
With the rise of Instagram and all of those picture perfect accounts that put mine to shame, iPhone snaps don’t quite cut it. So many backpackers are now making the switch to DSLR or bridge cameras.
The trouble with these is that, aside from being a little heavy and bulky themselves, they don’t have the ability to instantly edit and share to social media. Or the ability to automatically upload to the cloud – so if your camera is stolen, your memories are gone.
So what can you do? Stick with your iPhone and hope you can fake the quality with a filter? Lug around a laptop to upload your snaps? Or schedule regular internet café stops? (Are internet cafe’s still a thing? I actually have no idea!)
Maybe one of those options will work for you. But personally I’d prefer not to be carrying a laptop around if I’m going to be spending time on a sleeper train in India.
Here are some alternative options.
Ways to backup travel photos without a computer
Multiple Memory cards
Although this isn’t really a backup method, always make sure you take multiple memory cards with you.
This way, if you run out of space on one memory card, you will always have space on another without needing to delete any photos. This way, if you have backed up the photos onto another device, your photos will always be stored in at least two places.
Memory cards are pretty cheap so it’s a good idea to carry a few spares in a protective case.
Some cameras even have two slots for memory cards. These cameras will save a copy of every image to both cards. This is handy if something goes wrong with one card, but not so helpful if your camera is stolen. You’ll need another way to backup travel photos without a computer too.
Backup to your iPhone/iPad
You can backup travel photos without a computer by uploading them to your iPhone or iPad.
The first thing to check is whether your camera comes with built-in wifi. If it does you can use it to transfer photos across to your phone. Your phone will then backup to your cloud storage (if you have that turned on).
But what if you don’t have access to wifi? Or your camera, like mine, doesn’t have built-in wifi?
There is a handy little cable you can purchase which is a USB to Lightning adaptor. Plug your camera cable (the one you would normally use to transfer photos to a PC) into the adapter and import photos straight to your phone/ipad in seconds.
It’s surprisingly fast, even if you’re shooting in RAW.
By doing this on my recent trip every day I always knew my photos were on my Camera, my iPhone and my iPad. So if any of those got lost or stolen I had two other backups with me.
When the wifi was good I backed up to the cloud and my photos were extra safe.
Portable Hard Drive
Normally you need a laptop to take advantage of a portable hard drive, but now there are some available with a built in SD card slot – like this My Passport Wireless drive.
Portable hard drives are less expensive these days and come with a lot of storage. The My Passport Wireless drive is available with 1TB and 2TB capacity. That should be more than enough for any snap-happy traveller.
Whilst bulkier to carry around than a small cable, you’ll be able to store way more photos this way.
My favourite?
I use the USB Lightning cable and my iPhone/iPad. I always have those things with me anyway and I find that it is the cheapest, quickest way to backup travel photos and immediately edit and upload to Instagram.
Sometimes the wifi isn’t strong enough to backup to the cloud every day when you’re on the road. As I have the photos on my camera, iPhone and iPad, I feel that’s enough security. It would be pretty damn unlucky to lose all of those things on one trip!
I hope you’ve found this post useful? If you know of any other good options to backup travel photos without a computer then please feel free to comment below!
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