Try it before you finish this article.
One Docker Compose file, about ten minutes, and you can see how Noodle Gallery feels before committing to anything. The Google Takeout import can wait until you're ready.
Why people are leaving Google Photos
For a decade Google Photos was the default: free unlimited storage, "high quality" backups, face recognition that worked. Then in June 2021 Google ended the unlimited tier. The cap is now 15 GB, shared with Gmail and Google Drive.
The same library that used to cost nothing now runs €2 to €10 a month, forever, on an account Google can suspend at any moment for any reason. So people go looking. The way out is to host the photos yourself.
The four reasons people switch
- The bill never stops. Google One starts at €1.99 a month for 100 GB and climbs from there. A 4 TB hard drive is about €60, once. Past the second year, the self-hosted photo is the cheaper one.
- Your photos are training data. Google's terms let them scan and categorise everything you upload. Your kids' birthday photos get indexed by an algorithm that doesn't work for you.
- Account risk. Google account suspensions are rare but they happen, and when they do you lose access to everything: Photos, Gmail, Drive, YouTube, the lot. There is no support line to call. A self-hosted library can only be shut off by you.
- It's yours when the service ends. Google Reader. Google+. Google Inbox. Google Stadia. Google Hangouts. The list of sunset Google products is long and growing. Your photos belong somewhere that doesn't depend on a quarterly strategy review.
Noodle Gallery vs Google Photos at a glance
| Google Photos | Noodle Gallery | |
|---|---|---|
| Storage cost | €2 to €10 a month, recurring forever | €60 once for a 4 TB drive |
| Storage cap | 15 GB free, then 100 GB to 2 TB tiers | As large as your hardware |
| AI smart search | Yes, on Google servers | Yes, on your hardware (CLIP) |
| Face recognition | Yes | Yes, plus pet detection |
| Native mobile apps | iOS and Android | iOS and Android, with auto-backup |
| RAW file support | Limited | Full, every major manufacturer |
| Shared family albums | Albums and partner sharing | Shared Spaces with multi-contributor timelines |
| Data scanning / AI training | Allowed by Google's terms | Never, the data stays on your hardware |
| Account suspension risk | Possible, with limited recourse | No account to suspend |
| Future-proof | Subject to Google's roadmap | Open source, AGPL-3.0, can't be sunset |
Everything you love about Google Photos still works
Leaving usually stalls on the day to day features: smart search, named faces, phone backup, albums the family can add to. Noodle Gallery has all four.
Natural-language smart search
Type "sunset at the beach" or "kids playing in the snow" and you get those photos back, ranked by relevance. OpenAI's CLIP model does the ranking. It runs on your server, so the query never leaves the machine.See how smart search works →
Face recognition that you control
Faces are detected and clustered for you. Name someone once and Gallery finds them across the whole library. Pets get the same treatment: dogs, cats and birds are grouped separately.More on pet detection →
Automatic camera backup from your phone
The iOS and Android apps back up the camera roll in the background, like Google Photos does. A photo lands in your library minutes after you take it.
Shared Spaces for the whole family
Google Photos has albums. Noodle Gallery has Shared Spaces: one chronological timeline that every member adds to. Good for a trip, or for the running pile of kid photos the grandparents keep asking about.See Shared Spaces →
Migration tools that actually work
The import wizard reads Google Takeout archives in your browser. Dates, GPS coordinates, descriptions, favorites and album structure all survive the move. Nothing to run on the command line.How the import wizard works →
A €60 drive, one Docker Compose file, and about an hour of your evening. That is the whole bill for getting off Google Photos.
How to switch from Google Photos
About an hour of hands-on time. Most of the waiting is Google's export queue grinding through your library in the background.
- Set up Noodle Gallery with one Docker Compose file (five-minute install guide).
- Request a Google Takeout of the library, then wait for the mail. Big libraries take a while.
- Import the zip in the browser wizard. Check the count, then delete from Google.
Each step has gotchas: library size limits, metadata sidecars, Live Photos. The full guide covers them.Read the complete migration guide →
Frequently asked questions
Is Noodle Gallery really free?
Yes. Noodle Gallery is open source under AGPL-3.0, with no subscription and no storage cap. You pay for the hardware you run it on: a NAS, a Raspberry Pi 5, an old desktop, or a small VPS.
How much storage will I get compared to Google Photos?
Whatever your hardware can hold. A €60 4TB drive holds roughly 1 million photos from a modern phone. That is well past the 100GB Google One tier, and you pay for it once. Add another drive when you fill it.
Will my AI features still work without Google?
Yes, and they run on your own hardware. Noodle Gallery uses CLIP for natural language search ('sunset at the beach'), InsightFace for faces and RF-DETR for pet detection. The models run in the machine learning container on your server, so no query leaves your network.
Can my family still share albums with me?
Yes. Shared Spaces let several people add to one timeline, with each person's contributions tracked separately. Plain shared albums and per-photo share links work too.
Do I need to be a sysadmin to set this up?
No. One Docker Compose file, under five minutes. If you can paste a command into a terminal you can run Noodle Gallery, and the installation guide covers every step.
What happens to my photos if Noodle Gallery shuts down?
Nothing. Your photos sit on your disk in their original format and folder structure. If the project disappeared tomorrow the files would still be there, readable by any photo software.