Services like Google Hangouts, while immensely popular a few years ago, were sunset in favor of Google Chat. Some of the images you shared on the platform and other defunct services still remain on Album Archive, letting you view them in one convenient location, regardless of the device you sent them on. The company is now sending emails to some users informing them of Album Archive’s imminent shutdown and urging them to back up their content by using Google Takeout.
Multiple users, including a few on the Android Police team, have already received the email. But even if there’s no email about this change, manually visiting the Album Archive page from a Google account greets users with a banner on top informing them of their content’s deletion after July 19, 2023.
In the email, Google specifies that “content that’s only available in Album Archive” would be deleted from July 19. The company then elaborates that this could either be Google Hangouts data currently stored within Album Archive or even background images uploaded via the Gmail theme picker before 2018. Small thumbnail photos, album comments, or likes that may be saved within Album Archive would also be erased, the email informs.
The Album Archive page offers a gallery view of images or videos you sent on older Google services over the years, which in my case, was Hangouts. If there’s something worth keeping, Takeout lets you receive a download link through an email or transfer it to cloud services like Google Drive, Box, OneDrive, or Dropbox.
It’s worth pointing out that Google Takeout download links generated via email are only valid for seven days. Moreover, Google notes that Workspace users will require their admin’s go-ahead to download their images/videos from Takeout.
A support page detailing the sunsetting of Album Archive suggests that users could “view and manage” content beyond July 19 on services like Blogger, Hangouts (Chat), Google Photos, and their default Google Account which contains profile photos.
The Album Archive page is a nice way to kick back and go through some of the old content you shared on a Google service (and probably forgot about). But the email announcement certainly has some people confused, especially since the images and videos would still be available on other Google services beyond July 19, 2023.
