HACKER Q&A
📣 herodoturtle

How can I get photos/videos off my iPhone 12? (Ubuntu)


How can I get photos/videos off my iPhone 12? (Ubuntu)


  👤 lovelearning Accepted Answer ✓
I regularly backup GBs of photos and videos from Android to Ubuntu laptop. The fastest way I've found is to connect the phone via USB and 'cp' from the MTP mount (that's the storage drive on the phone) to my backup drive on the laptop.

The exact command I use is something like:

cp -avu $XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/gvfs/mtp\:host\=%5Busb%3A002%2C007%5D/Internal\ storage/DCIM/Camera/* /BACKUP/DIR | tee report-$(date --iso-8601).txt

You have to check that gvfs/ subdirectory to get your phone's exact USB identifier. If a photo already exists on local drive, it skips it.

I don't know if all this applies to iPhone 12. Can you attach it via USB and see an MTP drive in Ubuntu?


👤 frou_dh

👤 pantalaimon
Is connecting via USB not an option?