Comment by wallst07

Amazing question with nobody really answering your question 100%.

The answer is : it's hard. If you only have a iphone and more photos on your icloud than can fit on your phone, you're kinda screwed if you don't know what you're doing.

AFAIK Apple makes it very difficult to get all your icloud photos bulk downloaded, original quality off icloud.

Google is no better.

It's much easier to start backing up from the beginning but once you're stuck on icloud it's hard.