Apple's Merger of 'iCloud Documents and Data' Into iCloud Drive Now Complete
Last May, Apple Apple announced that it would be merging its iCloud Documents and Data service into iCloud Drive in May of 2022, and that transition has now been completed.
As noted in a support document updated today, users who previously relied on iCloud Documents and Data for syncing files across devices will need to turn iCloud Drive on in order to see their files.
iCloud Documents and Data, our legacy document syncing service, has been discontinued and replaced by iCloud Drive. If you used iCloud Documents and Data, your account has been migrated to iCloud Drive.
If you used the iCloud Documents and Data service, you need to turn on iCloud Drive to see your files. When you switch to iCloud Drive, the amount of storage space your saved files use in iCloud doesn't change.
Apple's support document provides instructions and minimum system requirements for iCloud Drive on iOS devices, Macs, and on the web at iCloud.com.
The vast majority of iCloud users already have iCloud Drive enabled, so they won't see any changes. But for users who had iCloud accounts prior to the introduction of iCloud Drive in 2014 and never enabled it, perhaps to maintain compatibility with pre-iOS 8 and pre-OS X Yosemite devices that couldn't support iCloud Drive, they will now need to turn it on in order to regain access to their files.
The older iCloud Documents and Data service kept cloud-synced data stored in folders specific to a given app, only allowing access to the data from that app. With iCloud Drive being a more full-featured syncing service, all of those files can now be accessed from a single location: the Files app on iOS and iPadOS, the iCloud Drive section of Finder on macOS, or the iCloud Drive section of iCloud.com.
Popular Stories
The upcoming iOS 18.4 update for the iPhone includes a smaller but meaningful improvement for Apple's in-car iPhone mirroring system CarPlay.
Specifically, CarPlay now shows a third row of icons, up from two rows previously. However, this change is only visible in vehicles with a larger center display. For example, a MacRumors Forums member noticed the change in a Toyota Tundra with a...
Daring Fireball's John Gruber today shared some strongly-worded comments about Apple's delayed personalized Siri features. Gruber is a well-known Apple pundit who has been writing about the company for more than two decades.
In a blog post titled "Something Is Rotten in the State of Cupertino," Gruber said Apple's credibility has been "damaged" by the delay:Keynote by keynote, product by...
Despite being released over two years ago, Apple's AirPods Pro 2 continue to dominate the wireless earbud market. However, with the AirPods Pro 3 expected to launch in 2025, anyone thinking of buying Apple's premium earbuds may be wondering if the next generation is worth holding out for.
Apart from their audio and noise-canceling performance, which are generally regarded as excellent for...
iPhones are finally getting a much-requested setting, but availability is limited.
The upcoming iOS 18.4 update introduces an option to set a default navigation app, other than Apple Maps, but unfortunately this new setting is limited to users in the EU. There, you can now set an app like Google Maps or Waze as your default navigation app on the iPhone by opening the Settings app and tapping ...
Apple's upcoming iPhone 17 Pro models are expected to feature a significant design overhaul, and a new image apparently taken on an assembly line for the unreleased devices appears to confirm the biggest rumored change.
Render of an iPhone 17 Pro model shared by Jon Prosser
The iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are rumored to adopt a horizontal camera bar reminiscent of Google's Pixel...
If you've been following iPhone rumors over the last few years, you may remember reading reports that Apple flirted with the idea of introducing a super high-end "Ultra" model that would either replace its Pro Max device or sit above it in Apple's smartphone hirearchy. These reports appeared in the pre-launch iPhone 15 and iPhone 16 rumor cycles, but ultimately came to nothing. Now though, the...
Apple is planning for a major design overhaul of the iPhone, iPad, and Mac interfaces with the introduction of iOS 19, iPadOS 19, and macOS 16 later this year, reports Bloomberg. The update will "fundamentally change" the look of Apple's operating system, introducing a more consistent cross-platform experience.
Apple plans to update the style of icons, menus, apps, windows, and system...
The Apple Intelligence features that Apple introduced with iOS 18 are not pushing people to upgrade their iPhones, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reiterated today. Apple's recent Siri failures are also going to have an impact on 2025 iPhone shipments, which the market is beginning to realize.
As early as last July, Kuo said expectations that Apple Intelligence could drive iPhone upgrades were...
Apple made a major misstep with the way that it handled the delay of Apple Intelligence features for Siri, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said today. Announcing the delay through a press statement was a bad decision, and Apple should instead have gone through official channels.
Kuo referenced the well-known "Antennagate" PR crisis when the iPhone 4 launched in 2010, and the way that then Apple...
