Every memory, somewhere and somewhen — somewhere yours.
Somewhen quietly backs up every photo and video you've ever taken to storage you own — filed by where and when it happened, so nothing's ever lost, saved twice, or locked in.
Pick your memories once. Somewhen files them away in the background and simply keeps count — no drama, no babysitting.
Every memory lands in Somewhen/<Year>/<City, Country>/ — a library your future self can actually wander.
Backups land in storage you own — plain folders you can open, move, or keep forever without us. Your own Google Drive today; more places that are yours, soon.
Somewhen remembers what's already safe. Reinstalls, restarts, re-runs — not one duplicate, ever. That's the whole promise.
Most photo services keep your memories in their cloud, in their format, on their terms. Somewhen works the other way around: it's the mover, not the landlord. It carries your originals into storage you own — your account, your credentials, your name on the door — and never touches the photo library it came from.
The destination is meant to be a choice. Today Somewhen backs up to your own Google Drive; support for more places you own — like your own S3‑compatible cloud bucket — is on the way. Wherever you point it, the shape is the same: plain folders by year and place, originals exactly as you shot them.
Somewhen/Year/City, Country — browse it, download it, or move it all with any file manager. No special format, no app required.Somewhen/ ├─ 2019/ │ ├─ Lisbon, Portugal/ │ └─ Porto, Portugal/ ├─ 2023/ │ └─ Tokyo, Japan/ │ ├─ IMG_2041.HEIC │ └─ clip_0192.MOV └─ 2025/ └─ Oaxaca, Mexico/
Once your library is safe, Somewhen draws it back to you: a map and timeline of your whole life, built from the places and years it already knows. Share it. Someone will ask how you made it.
Somewhen is an iPhone app that backs up the photos and videos you choose to your own Google Drive — organised into Year / City, Country folders — without ever changing your photo library. This is Somewhen's official home page.
Somewhen's purpose is to keep safe copies of your photo library somewhere that belongs to you — storage under your own account and credentials. Today that somewhere is your own Google Drive. Everything the app does serves that one goal:
Pick what to back up. A month-by-month grid of your photo library lets you choose exactly which photos and videos to back up; items already backed up are hidden.
Upload untouched originals. Somewhen uploads exact copies to a Somewhen/ folder in your Google Drive, sorted into Year / City, Country folders based on where each photo was taken. Videos upload over Wi-Fi.
Never upload twice. Duplicates are detected on your iPhone before anything is sent, so re-running a backup only uploads what's new.
Pause and resume. A backup can be paused, or interrupted entirely, and continues where it left off.
Never touch your library. Somewhen only reads and copies — it never deletes or modifies anything in your photo library or in your Drive.
Somewhen has no servers of its own: your photos move directly from your iPhone to your Google Drive, and all processing happens on your device.
Somewhen asks you to sign in with Google and requests two things, each for a single, specific purpose:
Received from Google Sign-In and shown inside the app so you can always see which Google account your backups are going to. It is displayed on your device and used for nothing else.
drive.fileUsed to create the Somewhen/ folder tree, upload the photo and video copies you selected, and read back only its own uploads so the app knows what is already backed up. This permission does not let Somewhen see, read, or change any other file in your Drive.
Your data is never sold, shared, or transferred to anyone. Somewhen has no backend, no analytics, and no advertising — the only place your data goes is your own Google Drive, under your own credentials. Full details are in the Privacy Policy.
To storage you own — today, your own Google Drive, under a Somewhen/ folder, using your own Google credentials. Nothing passes through any server of ours — Somewhen has no backend.
That's the idea Somewhen is built around: your memories should live in storage that belongs to you. Today the destination is your own Google Drive; support for more destinations you own — like an S3-compatible cloud bucket — is planned. Wherever they land, the format is the same: plain folders, untouched originals.
No. Somewhen only ever reads and copies. Your originals in the Photos app are never modified or deleted, and the app never deletes the backed-up files in your Drive.
Somewhen uses Google's drive.file permission, which limits it to the files and folders it creates in your Drive. It cannot see or touch anything else in your Drive.
Sign in with Google, pick the photos and videos you want in the grid, and start the backup. You can pause and resume at any time; an interrupted run continues where it left off without re-uploading.
Yes. Videos back up over Wi-Fi and stream directly to your Drive.
Nothing. Your backup is ordinary files in your own storage — delete the app and every folder and original stays exactly where it is, readable with any file browser. Somewhen even keeps its index of what's backed up inside your storage, so if you reinstall later it can rebuild what it knew and carry on without re-uploading.
In Settings, Delete Account revokes Somewhen's Google access and erases all on-device data; files already in your Drive are left in place. Sign Out clears the on-device index only.
Email help@somewhen.dev — questions, problems, and ideas all welcome.
Nothing lost. Nothing twice. Nothing locked in. Your originals live in storage you own, in folders you can read without us.