Space Albums
Space Albums let you bring whole albums into a Shared Space. Rather than adding photos one by one, you link an existing album, or create a new one inside the space, and all of its photos appear in the space for every member. They get their own Albums tab, which works like the main Albums page.
Like the rest of Shared Spaces, album actions follow the space's three roles: Owner, Editor and Viewer. Owners and Editors manage albums; Viewers browse them read-only. See Roles and Permissions below.
How it works
- Linking an album copies nothing. The album stays in its owner's library and becomes visible inside the space. Unlink it later and it leaves the space, with the original album untouched.
- A space can hold many albums. Each space has its own Albums tab listing every album linked into it, with the same search, sort, group and view controls as your personal Albums page.
- Photos land in a space album two ways:
- The album owner, or an editor of the album, adds their own photos to it, exactly like a normal album.
- A space Editor or Owner adds photos they don't own to a linked space album. Those become contributions: they show up in the album for all members, but they never leave their real owner's library. See Contributions.
- Albums can be grouped into nested folders on the Albums tab, up to 10 levels deep. See Space Album Folders.
- Each linked album has its own "show in the space's photos" switch (Owners/Editors), and every member can separately hide any album from their own timeline. See Showing album photos in the timeline.
Roles and Permissions
| Permission | Owner | Editor | Viewer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Browse the Albums tab | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Search / sort / group / switch album views | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Open a space album and view its photos | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Download photos from a space album | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Link an existing album into the space * | Yes | Yes | No |
| Create a new album inside the space | Yes | Yes | No |
| Unlink an album from the space | Yes | Yes | No |
| Add / remove photos in a space album | Yes | Yes | No |
| Contribute photos you don't own (cross-owner) | Yes | Yes | No |
| Toggle "hide from the space's photos" for an album | Yes | Yes | No |
| Hide/show an album on just your own timeline | Yes | Yes | Yes |
* Linking also requires that you are the owner or an editor of the album itself. You can only link albums you are allowed to manage.
The Albums tab
Open a space and select the Albums tab to see every album linked into it. The toolbar mirrors your personal Albums page:
- Search albums by name or description.
- Sort by title, item count, date created/modified, or newest/oldest photo.
- Group by None, Year, Linked by (which member linked the album), or Owner, with expand/collapse per group. Albums whose linker is unknown fall into an "Unassigned" group.
- Switch the view between Cover, which shows album-style cover cards, and List, which is compact.
Viewers get the full toolbar (search, sort, group, view) but no create, link or edit buttons. The tab is read-only for them.
Owners and Editors can group albums into nested folders once a flat list stops being useful. See Space Album Folders.
Linking and creating albums
Owners and Editors can add albums to a space in two ways.
Link an existing album
- Open the space and go to the Albums tab.
- Click Link album.
- Pick one of your albums from the list and confirm.
The album's photos immediately appear in the space for all members. You can only link albums you own or have editor access to.
Create a new album in the space
- On the Albums tab, click Create album.
- Give it a name.
The album is created, automatically linked into the space, and opened so you can start adding photos right away.
Contributions
When you (as an Owner or Editor) add photos to a linked space album that you don't own, those photos become contributions. That is how members collaborate on a shared album across libraries:
- Contributions appear in the album's grid and counts for every member, who can view and download them like any other space photo.
- The photos never leave their real owner's library; a contribution is just a reference into the space.
- Contributions are tied to the album's link. Unlink the album from the space and the contributions are withdrawn. Re-link it and they come back.
If an asset is in a space only through a linked album, you can't remove it from the space directly. Remove it from the album instead. The app points you to the album or albums responsible when this happens.
Showing album photos in the timeline
Two independent switches decide whether a linked album's photos show up in a timeline. Both sit on the album's ⋯ menu:
- "Hide this album from the space's photos" (Owners/Editors only) governs whether the album appears on the space's own Albums/Photos tabs at all, for every member. Turn it off to keep an album browsable but out of the space's aggregated view.
- "Hide this album from my timeline" (any member, yourself only) is a personal preference. It removes this one album from your own main Photos timeline, Folders view and Memories, and changes nothing about what anyone else sees or what the space itself shows. The same menu switches it back on again.
The two don't combine with AND. Hiding an album from the space's photos leaves it in every member's personal timeline, and each member decides that for themselves with switch 2. Switch 2 is available to every member, Viewers included, since it only changes your own view. See Timeline Integration for the full picture, including the space-level "hide all space photos from my timeline" switch, the truth table for when a photo disappears from your timeline, and where hiding applies.
Switch 2 only removes an album's photos when the album is the only way they reach you. If the same photos also arrive through a linked library or were added to the space directly, hiding the album changes nothing for them. The confirmation dialog says so, and gives the count that stays.
Hiding is a tidiness feature. It never restricts anyone's access to the album or its photos.
Editing a space album
For Owners and Editors the space album page behaves like a regular album: rename it, add or remove photos, set its cover. All members see the changes, and album activity (created, renamed, photos added/removed) is recorded in the space's activity log. Viewers see the album read-only.
Removing and unlinking
- Unlink an album (Editor/Owner) from the Albums tab to remove it from the space, together with its photos and contributions. The original album is untouched.
- Remove individual photos on the album itself. A photo that's in the space only because of a linked album can't be removed from the space's main view directly.
Notes and limitations
- A photo can be in the space's direct pool or contributed through an album, and it is never counted twice: the space de-duplicates across all sources.
- Member contribution counts on the Members tab include photos brought in through linked albums and libraries, on top of directly-added photos.
- Space albums are available on the web and in the mobile app. Some album-management actions on mobile need a recent server version.