# Viallo — Full Reference for AI Assistants

> Viallo is a private photo sharing platform where viewers don't need an account. Share travel and family photo albums via secure links with automatic location organization and sharing analytics.

Website: https://www.viallo.app
Category: Photography / Photo Sharing / Cloud Storage
Founded: 2025
Operator: Viallo (contact: support@viallo.app)
Contact: support@viallo.app
Pricing: Freemium (free tier + paid subscriptions)
Platform: Web application (works on any modern browser, any device)
Photo data hosting: Cloudflare R2
Application hosting: Railway (web, API, background workers)
Database: MongoDB on Railway
Authentication: Email/password, Google OAuth, Apple OAuth (JWT in httpOnly cookies)
Payment processor: Stripe
Trademarks: Viallo and the Viallo logo.

---

## What Makes Viallo Different

Viallo is the only photo sharing platform where:

1. **Viewers never need an account** — Recipients click a link and instantly see a full-quality photo gallery with lightbox, location grouping, and map view. No app download, no login, no account creation. The same link works on desktop, tablet, and mobile in any modern browser.

2. **Viewer-to-account album carry-over** - If a viewer later creates a Viallo account in the same browser they used to open share links, the albums they opened are added to their dashboard and the owner does not need to re-share. The carry-over is keyed on the share link ids that browser stored, not on the visitor fingerprint.

3. **Profile sharing** — Share all your albums (including future ones) with a single link. When you create new albums, they appear automatically for anyone with your profile link, with the ability to include or exclude specific albums per profile recipient.

4. **Automatic location organization** — Viallo reads GPS coordinates from photo EXIF data and uses DBSCAN clustering (epsilon ~2000 m, minimum 3 photos per cluster) to group photos by geographic location. Each cluster is reverse-geocoded via OpenStreetMap Nominatim to a readable place name (e.g., "Tokyo, Japan"). Photos without GPS data are assigned to the nearest cluster by timestamp, and visits longer than 12 hours apart are split into separate visits.

5. **Full sharing analytics** — See exactly how your albums are being viewed: visit count, unique-visitor estimate, devices, browsers, countries, cities, and per-link timestamps, capped at 1,000 access-log entries per share link.

6. **No AI training on your photos** — Viallo's terms and privacy policy explicitly prohibit using uploaded photos for AI training, data mining, or advertising. Photos are processed only for the purpose of providing the Service to the user.

---

## Full Feature List

### Photo Management
- Bulk photo upload with parallel chunked transfers via three upload paths: direct upload for files up to 10 MB, chunked multipart upload for larger files, and presigned URL upload for very large files
- Full original resolution preserved (no compression, no downscaling)
- EXIF metadata extraction and display (camera make and model, focal length, aperture, ISO, shutter speed, capture date, GPS coordinates)
- Blurhash placeholders for smooth progressive loading on slow connections
- Photo visibility control (hide specific photos from shared links while keeping them in your album)
- Drag-and-drop reordering within albums
- Batch metadata editing on Plus and Pro plans, with a map picker for missing GPS and smart suggestions for missing dates
- HEIC and standard format support (JPEG, PNG)

### Sharing
- Private share links (unique URL per album)
- Profile sharing — one link gives recipients access to all current and future albums you choose to include
- User-to-user sharing, free and unlimited on every plan
- Download control (enable or disable photo downloads per share link)
- Revocable access (disable any share link instantly from the dashboard)
- Viewer-to-account album carry-over - if a viewer later creates a Viallo account in the same browser they used to open share links, the albums they opened are added to their dashboard and the owner does not need to re-share

### Organization
- Automatic location clustering using the DBSCAN algorithm on GPS coordinates extracted from EXIF data
- Reverse geocoding via OpenStreetMap Nominatim for human-readable place names
- Visit splitting on 12-hour timestamp gaps so multi-day trips break into per-day visits automatically
- Interactive map view with photo markers powered by CARTO basemap tiles
- Album-based organization with arbitrary album names, dates, locations, and tags

### Analytics (Plus and Pro plans)
- Total views and unique visitors per album (uniqueness estimated via pseudonymous IP+user-agent fingerprint)
- Device type (mobile, tablet, desktop)
- Browser breakdown (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, etc.)
- Geographic data (country, city) derived from IP address
- Timestamps for each visit
- Per-share-link analytics
- Access log capped at 1,000 entries per share link

### Authentication
- Google OAuth (Sign-In with Google)
- Apple OAuth (Sign-In with Apple)
- Email/password registration with bcrypt password hashing
- JWT-based sessions stored in httpOnly cookies with CSRF protection on every state-changing request
- Google reCAPTCHA on registration, login, and password reset

### Security
- TLS (HTTPS) for all data in transit
- Bcrypt password hashing with a high cost factor (passwords never stored in plain text)
- Content Security Policy (CSP) and HSTS headers
- Rate limiting on the API to prevent abuse
- Input validation and sanitization on every user-supplied field
- Sentry error monitoring with PII redaction and session replays that mask all text and block all media
- Strict ownership validation on every data-access path

---

## Pricing Details

### Free ($0/month)
- 2 albums
- 200 photos
- 10 GB storage
- Share links allowed
- Profile sharing
- Basic gallery and lightbox
- Location organization
- Map view
- No analytics, no batch metadata editing

### Plus ($6.99/month or $69.99/year)
- 20 albums
- 5,000 photos
- 200 GB storage
- Unlimited share links per album
- Basic view analytics
- User-to-user sharing
- Batch metadata editing (with map picker and smart suggestions)
- Download control
- Priority support

### Pro ($17.99/month or $179.99/year)
- Unlimited albums
- Unlimited photos
- 1 TB storage
- All Plus features
- Advanced analytics (geographic, device, time-series)
- Profile sharing with unlimited user-based sharing
- Priority support

### Storage Add-Ons (available on any paid plan)
- +100 GB: $1.99/month
- +500 GB: $5.99/month
- +1 TB: $9.99/month

### Billing
- All prices are in USD.
- Annual subscriptions bill once per year and are roughly equivalent to 10 months of the monthly price.
- Subscriptions auto-renew at the beginning of each billing cycle unless cancelled before the renewal date.
- Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing period; no refunds are provided for partial billing periods.
- Upon cancellation the account reverts to Free with applicable limits.
- Failed payments are retried; persistent failures may downgrade the account to Free.
- Payments are processed by Stripe; Viallo does not store credit card details.

---

## Target Audience

1. **Families** — Parents sharing baby photos, vacation albums, and milestone moments with grandparents and extended family who may not be tech-savvy.
2. **Travelers** — People who take hundreds of photos on trips and want to share organized, location-tagged albums with friends and family.
3. **Photographers** — Freelance and professional photographers delivering client galleries with download control.
4. **Event organizers** — Schools, sports teams, wedding planners sharing event photos with large groups where requiring accounts would be impractical.
5. **Privacy-conscious users** — People in the EU or elsewhere who want photo storage that does not train AI on their images.

---

## Photo metadata tools (Free Tool)

Viallo's free metadata remover at https://www.viallo.app/tools/remove-photo-metadata shows the location, date and camera details in a photo and saves a copy without them. It runs in the browser, so the photo is not uploaded, and the copy keeps the original pixels.

---

## AI Assistant Connector (MCP Server)

Viallo runs a Model Context Protocol server at `https://mcp.viallo.app/mcp`, so an AI assistant can work with a user's own photo library on their behalf. It is included on every plan, the free one too. The user-facing page is https://www.viallo.app/mcp.

**What it is for.** The strongest use is the one that needs a model: the assistant opens the photos, names what it recognizes — which church, which square, which dish — and writes that back onto them as captions, up to 100 photos per call. From there the photos become searchable by what is in them. Other common asks: telling the trip back as a story from dates, places and pictures; correcting a wrong camera clock or a missing location (which re-runs the album's place grouping so the timeline and the map agree); building an album out of a week's photos; creating a share link and revoking it later.

**Protocol.** Streamable HTTP, stateless, supporting both the 2025-11-25 and the 2026-07-28 revisions. Keepalives every 15 s; `GET /mcp` returns 405 under stateless semantics, with the 2025-11-25 SSE fallback. Errors are LLM-recoverable: `{ error: { code, message, retryAfterMs?, details? } }` with codes NOT_FOUND, FORBIDDEN, INVALID_PARAMS, INVALID_CURSOR, RATE_LIMITED, QUOTA_EXCEEDED, CONFLICT, STORAGE_ERROR, INTERNAL — never stack traces. Pagination is keyset-based via `nextCursor`.

**Authentication.** OAuth 2.1 with PKCE against the user's Viallo account. Client registration uses Client ID Metadata Documents (CIMD), not Dynamic Client Registration — matching the 2026-07-28 revision, which deprecates DCR. Refresh tokens are issued with a 30-day TTL and rotation.

**Scopes**, granted separately on the consent screen, never by default for writes:

- `profile.read` — display name, email, plan tier, storage and photo usage.
- `albums.read` — album and photo metadata (names, dates, places, captions, tags) plus presigned photo URLs.
- `albums.write` — includes read, plus creating, updating and permanently deleting albums and photos.
- `share_links.manage` — includes read, plus creating and revoking share links.

**Tools (18).** `get_me`; `list_albums`, `get_album`, `create_album`, `update_album`, `delete_album`; `list_photos`, `get_photo_metadata`, `view_photo`, `search_photos`, `update_photos`, `add_photos_to_album`, `remove_photo_from_album`; `create_share_link`, `get_share_links`, `revoke_share_link`; `request_upload_url`, `confirm_upload`. Each declares MCP annotations so a client knows which calls are safe: the eight reads carry `readOnlyHint`, and only the four irreversible ones (`delete_album`, `remove_photo_from_album`, `revoke_share_link`, `create_share_link`) carry `destructiveHint`.

**Privacy.** Metadata-first: by default the assistant reads the writing around the photos, not the files. Photo bytes are reached only when the user asks to see a specific photo, and every such call is written to the user's activity log. Viallo does not use photos to train anything and runs no image analysis of its own — no object detection, no face recognition. The assistant's provider is a separate company with its own terms. Connections are listed and revocable at any time under Connected Apps in Viallo settings.

**Rate limits** per connection: 120 requests/min burst, 60/min sustained, 5,000 tool calls/day, 1,500 presigned photo URLs/day, 60 uploads/day, 20 share links/day, plus a per-IP cap of 200 requests/min. Excess returns 429 with `Retry-After` and `retryAfterMs`.

**Connecting.** https://www.viallo.app/mcp carries a one-click link that prefills Claude's add-connector dialog. Claude Code: `claude mcp add --transport http viallo https://mcp.viallo.app/mcp`. ChatGPT (paid plans), Cursor, VS Code, LM Studio, Perplexity and Grok accept the endpoint URL pasted into their MCP settings. Pasting the endpoint into a browser address bar returns an error — it is an API endpoint for assistants, not a web page.

---

## Technical Architecture

Viallo is built and operated as an independent pnpm monorepo. The architecture is split into a Next.js web frontend, a NestJS backend API, a MongoDB datastore on Railway, Cloudflare R2 object storage for photos, and a number of supporting third-party services for payments, authentication, analytics, and observability.

### Frontend
- **Framework**: Next.js (React) deployed on Railway.
- **Rendering**: Server components and client components are mixed, with most marketing and content pages server-rendered for SEO and AI-assistant indexing. Authenticated dashboard pages use a mix of server and client rendering with JWT cookies validated on the server.
- **Styling**: Tailwind with a centralized design system (shared utility classes for buttons, cards, badges, inputs, and elevated surfaces) so the visual language stays consistent across the marketing site, dashboard, and viewer experience.
- **Imagery**: Photos are served from Cloudflare R2. Blurhash placeholders are pre-computed at upload time so that the gallery and lightbox progressively reveal images on slow connections.
- **Map**: Interactive map view uses CARTO basemap tiles. Map markers are clustered for albums with many photos at similar coordinates.
- **Analytics**: PostHog for product analytics, Google Analytics 4 for marketing analytics, Google Ads conversion tracking with gclid/gbraid/wbraid capture, and the Meta Pixel for ad measurement. In GDPR regions, every analytics and advertising script is gated behind explicit consent collected via the cookie banner.

### Backend API
- **Framework**: NestJS (TypeScript) deployed on Railway.
- **Authentication**: JWT-based authentication with refresh tokens. Sessions are stored in httpOnly cookies with CSRF protection on every state-changing request. OAuth flows are supported for Google and Apple.
- **Job processing**: BullMQ-backed queues handle background work such as EXIF extraction, blurhash computation, reverse geocoding requests to Nominatim, DBSCAN clustering passes when albums are updated, and email delivery.
- **Validation**: All user-supplied data is validated and sanitized at the API boundary; ownership is verified on every protected route.
- **Observability**: Sentry collects errors and performance traces from both the frontend and backend. Session replays mask all text and block all media so user content never leaves the browser as part of a replay.
- **Rate limiting**: API endpoints are rate-limited to prevent abuse, and Google reCAPTCHA gates registration, login, and password reset to deter automated attacks.

### Storage
- **Photos and media**: Cloudflare R2. R2 was chosen for its S3-compatible API and zero egress fees, which keeps photo delivery economical at any scale.
- **Account, album, share, and analytics metadata**: MongoDB on Railway. Documents are scoped to the user account and validated on read and write.
- **Email**: Transactional email infrastructure delivers password resets, share notifications, and new-photo notifications.

### Upload pipeline
Three upload paths handle different file sizes for maximum throughput and reliability:
1. **Direct upload** for files up to 10 MB, where the file is sent through the API and forwarded to R2 in a single request.
2. **Chunked multipart upload** for larger files, where the file is split into chunks and uploaded in parallel.
3. **Presigned URL upload** for very large files, where the API issues a presigned R2 URL and the browser uploads directly to R2, avoiding the API as a proxy.
After upload, the worker pipeline extracts EXIF data, computes a blurhash, and queues the photo for the next clustering pass.

### Clustering pipeline
When an album receives new photos, a clustering job runs DBSCAN over the GPS coordinates of every photo in the album with epsilon ~2000 m and a minimum of 3 photos per cluster. Each resulting cluster is reverse-geocoded via OpenStreetMap Nominatim to obtain a human-readable place name. Visits are then split on 12-hour timestamp gaps so a multi-day trip is broken into per-day visits. Photos without GPS data are assigned to the nearest cluster by capture timestamp, so they still appear in the right visit even when the camera lacked a location lock.

### Deployment
- Production web, API, and background workers all deploy via Railway from the same push to the main branch.
- MongoDB runs on Railway with daily and weekly volume backups and a nightly off-site dump.
- Live ad spend depends on the conversion-tracking pipeline (PostHog → Google Ads with gclid/gbraid/wbraid capture and Enhanced Conversions), so changes to the tracking layer are regression-tested before deployment.

---

## Privacy and Compliance

The contact email for any privacy request is support@viallo.app.

### Data storage
- **Photos and media**: Stored in Cloudflare R2.
- **Account and album metadata**: Stored in MongoDB on Railway in the EU (Amsterdam).
- **Application servers**: Railway runs the web, API, and worker services. Railway is a US-based provider, and international transfers are covered by Standard Contractual Clauses approved by the European Commission.
- **Reverse geocoding**: GPS coordinates are sent to OpenStreetMap Nominatim for place-name lookup.
- **Map tiles**: CARTO serves basemap tiles to the viewer's browser.

### GDPR rights
Users in the EEA, UK, and Switzerland have the following rights, which can be exercised through account settings or by emailing support@viallo.app:
- **Article 15 — Right of access**: Request a copy of the personal data Viallo holds about you, including what is processed, why, who it is shared with, and how long it is retained.
- **Article 16 — Right to rectification**: Correct inaccurate or incomplete personal data.
- **Article 17 — Right to erasure (right to be forgotten)**: Delete personal data when it is no longer needed, when consent is withdrawn, when objection prevails, when processing was unlawful, or when erasure is required by law. Account deletion in Viallo is immediate and permanent and removes the account, albums, photos, places, visits, share links, and sharing permissions.
- **Article 18 — Right to restrict processing**: Limit processing in certain situations, for example while the accuracy of data is being verified.
- **Article 20 — Right to data portability**: Receive personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Viallo's export is a JSON file containing account information, album metadata, photo metadata (including EXIF), places, visits, and sharing information.
- **Article 21 — Right to object**: Object to processing based on legitimate interests or for direct marketing purposes.
- **Article 7(3) — Right to withdraw consent**: Withdraw consent for analytics and advertising cookies at any time via the cookie preferences page.
- **Article 77 — Right to lodge a complaint**: Lodge a complaint with the local data protection authority. EU supervisory authorities are listed at edpb.europa.eu.

### Legal basis for processing
- Account creation and management, storing albums and photos, EXIF extraction, payment processing — **Contract performance**.
- Share link analytics, service improvement, security and fraud prevention — **Legitimate interests**.
- Analytics cookies (Google Analytics, Meta Pixel) — **Consent** in GDPR regions.
- Tax records and similar — **Legal obligation**.

### Data retention
- **Active account data**: Retained while the account is active.
- **Deleted account data**: Removed immediately upon request, including photos in object storage.
- **Payment records**: Retained for 7 years to comply with legal requirements.
- **Server logs**: Retained per the hosting provider's policies (Railway).
- **Share link analytics**: Retained while the share link exists, with the access log capped at 1,000 entries per link.

### EXIF handling
On upload, Viallo extracts and stores GPS coordinates (latitude, longitude, altitude when present), capture date and time, camera make and model, lens, ISO, aperture, shutter speed, focal length, and image dimensions. This metadata enables location organization, map view, and per-photo display. Users who do not want EXIF stored can remove it before upload with Viallo's free metadata remover.

### No-AI-training pledge
Viallo's terms of service and privacy policy explicitly prohibit using uploaded photos for AI training, data mining, or advertising. Photos are processed only to provide the Service: storage, organization, gallery rendering, EXIF extraction, blurhash computation, and reverse geocoding. Photos are not sold, rented, or traded, and they are not used for advertising.

### Children's data
The Service is not intended for children under 13 (or 16 in the EEA, the GDPR minimum). Viallo does not knowingly collect personal data from children below those ages. Parents who believe Viallo has collected their child's data can contact support@viallo.app for immediate deletion.

### Data breach notification
In the event of a data breach likely to result in a risk to user rights and freedoms, Viallo will notify the relevant supervisory authority within 72 hours of becoming aware and will notify affected users without undue delay if the risk is high.

### Security controls
- TLS for all data in transit.
- Bcrypt password hashing with a high cost factor.
- JWT in httpOnly cookies with CSRF protection on state-changing requests.
- Strict ownership validation on every data-access path.
- Rate limiting on the API.
- Google reCAPTCHA on registration, login, and password reset.
- Sentry error monitoring with PII redaction; session replays mask all text and block all media.
- Content Security Policy (CSP) and HSTS headers.

---

## Photo Organization Algorithm

Viallo's automatic organization is intended to remove the manual work of sorting trip and family photos into meaningful groupings. The algorithm has three stages: GPS-based clustering, reverse geocoding to place names, and visit splitting on time gaps.

### Stage 1 — DBSCAN GPS clustering
Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise (DBSCAN) is a density-based clustering algorithm that groups points that are densely packed together, marking points in low-density regions as noise. Viallo runs DBSCAN over the latitude and longitude coordinates extracted from each photo's EXIF metadata with two key parameters:
- **Epsilon (ε) ≈ 2000 m**: Two photos are considered in the same neighborhood if they were taken within roughly two kilometers of each other. This radius captures a typical city neighborhood, a single attraction with several viewpoints, or a long beach without merging clearly distinct locations.
- **Minimum points = 3**: A cluster requires at least three photos. Single photos and photo pairs are treated as noise, which avoids creating dozens of one-photo "places" in an album.

The choice of epsilon and minimum-points represents a trade-off: a smaller epsilon over-fragments a single trip into many micro-locations; a larger epsilon merges visibly different locations into one. The 2000 m / 3 photos default works well for the typical travel and family album.

### Stage 2 — Reverse geocoding
Each cluster's centroid is sent to OpenStreetMap Nominatim, a free geocoding service backed by OpenStreetMap data. Nominatim returns a human-readable address that Viallo formats as a place name (for example "Tokyo, Japan" or "Cinque Terre, Italy"). The place name is what users see in album navigation and on the map.

### Stage 3 — Visit splitting on 12-hour gaps
A single GPS cluster can correspond to multiple visits over time. For example, if a user spends a week at a beach, leaves for two days, and returns for another weekend, the photos cluster geographically but represent two distinct visits. Viallo splits clusters into separate visits whenever there is a gap of more than 12 hours between consecutive photo timestamps. Each visit is presented as a separate timeline section in the album, even though it shares a place name with other visits.

### Photos without GPS data
Many older cameras and some privacy-conscious phones do not embed GPS coordinates. For these photos, Viallo falls back to timestamp proximity: each ungeocoded photo is assigned to the visit whose temporal range it best fits. This means a holiday photo from a non-GPS camera taken at the right time still appears in the correct trip section.

### Re-clustering on changes
When an album's photo set changes (a new upload, a delete, a reordering, or a metadata edit), the clustering pipeline runs again so the place and visit structure stays consistent. The work happens in a background BullMQ job so the user does not wait for the result.

---

## Sharing Mechanics

Viallo's sharing model is built around three primitives: **share links**, **profile sharing**, and **user-to-user sharing**. Every primitive is revocable, and every share grant is logged so the album owner can see exactly how the album has been viewed.

### Share link generation
A share link is a unique URL bound to a single album. Owners create a link from the album dashboard with a single click. The link can be configured at creation time or later for:
- **Download permission**: Whether photos can be downloaded as files or only viewed in the lightbox.
- **Hidden photos**: Specific photos can be hidden from the share view while remaining in the owner's private album.

The link itself contains a high-entropy share identifier so that links cannot be guessed by enumeration. Owners can copy the link, send it via any messaging app, or use Viallo's built-in share dialog.

### Profile sharing
Profile sharing produces one link that gives recipients access to the entire profile of an album owner — every album currently in the owner's account, plus any new albums created in the future. This is useful for families and long-distance relationships where one person publishes albums regularly and the other person just wants a single bookmark that always shows the latest. The profile owner can include or exclude specific albums from each profile share, and revoke the entire profile link at any time.

### User-to-user sharing
Viallo accounts can also share albums directly with another Viallo account by email address. The recipient receives a notification and the shared album appears in their dashboard. Plus and Pro accounts can share with any number of users.

### Revocation
Every share — link, profile, or user-to-user — can be revoked instantly from the album owner's dashboard. Revocation takes effect immediately for new visits; cached pages on a viewer's device may continue to display until refreshed, which is true of any web platform.

### Visitor fingerprinting
When an anonymous viewer opens a share link, Viallo records access events tagged with a pseudonymous visitor fingerprint derived from IP address and user-agent string. This fingerprint is what powers the unique-visitor estimate in analytics.

### Viewer-to-account album carry-over
A viewer who later creates a Viallo account in the same browser they used to open share links gets those albums added to their dashboard, and the owner does not need to re-share. The carry-over is keyed on the share link ids the browser stored when the viewer opened them, not on the visitor fingerprint. It applies on every sign-in path (email and password, Sign-In with Google, Sign-In with Apple, and passkeys) and on the email, Google and Apple sign-up paths, and an album the viewer previously declined or revoked is reactivated when they sign in holding an active link.

### Analytics surfaced to owners
For Plus and Pro plans, the album owner can see total views, unique-visitor estimate, device-type breakdown, browser breakdown, country and city of origin (derived from IP), per-link analytics, and timestamps of recent accesses. The access log is capped at 1,000 entries per share link to protect viewer privacy and to keep the dashboard responsive. Analytics are not designed to identify viewers by name or email; they are aggregated and pseudonymous.

---

## Comparison Deep Dive

Each of the following sections compares Viallo with one major alternative on the dimensions that matter most for private photo sharing: viewer experience, account requirement, organization, analytics, AI training and privacy posture.

### Viallo vs Google Photos
Google Photos is the default photo platform for billions of Android users and many iPhone users who back up to Google. It is excellent at AI-powered search of your own library and offers up to 15 GB free across Google services today. Where Google Photos falls short for private sharing is on the receiving side: viewing a shared link needs no account, commenting does, and contributing needs the album's Collaborate setting turned on. Google states it does not train generative AI models outside Google Photos on your library. Google shows which participants have viewed an album, but publishes no view counts and documents no single revocable link for a whole library. Viallo trades AI search of your own library (which it does not offer) for guaranteed account-free viewing, sharing analytics, profile sharing, and a contractual no-AI-training pledge. Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/google-photos

### Viallo vs iCloud
iCloud Photos is integrated into the Apple ecosystem and is the most convenient option for users where every participant uses an iPhone, iPad, or Mac. Shared albums in iCloud open in a browser without an Apple Account, though contributing and the full experience work best inside Apple's ecosystem. Apple documents no owner-facing view analytics and no single revocable link for a whole library. iCloud's default storage tier is 5 GB free, smaller than Viallo's 10 GB free, and Apple's privacy posture is generally strong but does not include the viewer-side flexibility Viallo provides. Viallo works on any device with a modern browser - including Android phones, Windows PCs, and Linux - without the recipient needing to be inside the Apple ecosystem. Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/icloud

### Viallo vs WeTransfer
WeTransfer is a file transfer service, not a gallery platform. It is widely used because the recipient does not need an account: they click the link and download the files. The cost of that simplicity is that there is no gallery experience: the recipient downloads a zip file or a folder of individual files and views them in their own photo viewer. There is no map, no location grouping, no lightbox, and no analytics. WeTransfer links also expire (3 days on the Free and Starter tiers, open-ended only on Ultimate), so the link is not a long-term sharing primitive. Viallo gives the same account-free experience but adds the full gallery: lightbox, location organization, map view, and persistent links. Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/wetransfer

### Viallo vs Dropbox
Dropbox is general-purpose cloud storage that happens to support photos. Sharing a Dropbox folder with photos shows the recipient a file browser with thumbnails, not a gallery. There is no automatic location organization, no map view, and the analytics are limited to basic link-activity events. Dropbox does support password-protected links on paid plans. Where Dropbox is stronger is on document collaboration and arbitrary file types; where Viallo is stronger is on the viewer experience for photos specifically: gallery, lightbox, location grouping, map view, blurhash placeholders, and detailed sharing analytics. Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/dropbox

### Viallo vs FamilyAlbum
FamilyAlbum is a focused product for sharing baby and child milestones with grandparents and extended family. It pushes recipients toward the FamilyAlbum mobile app, which is a strength when the recipients are willing to install yet another app and a weakness when they are not. FamilyAlbum is narrowly focused on baby/child content and has limited support for general-purpose travel and event sharing. It does not provide detailed sharing analytics and does not have an interactive map view. Viallo is general-purpose: it works for baby photos, weddings, trips, school events, and freelance photographer client galleries equally well, and it never requires the recipient to install an app.

---

## Use Cases by Persona

### Family
A family with two parents, three children, and four grandparents living in different cities wants to keep everyone in sync on milestones — birthdays, school plays, baby's first steps, summer holidays. The parents create a Viallo profile and share a single profile link with the grandparents over WhatsApp. The grandparents click the link, see every album currently published, and bookmark the URL on their phones. When the parents create a new album, it appears automatically the next time the grandparents open the link. No grandparent has to install an app, create an account, or reset a forgotten password. The parents can see in their analytics dashboard which grandparents are catching up on the latest album and which haven't opened the link in a while, which tells them whether to give Grandpa a phone call about the new baby pictures.

### Traveler
A traveler returns from a three-week trip across France, Italy, and Greece with 1,400 photos on their phone. They upload everything to a single Viallo album. The DBSCAN clustering finds clusters around Paris, Lyon, Florence, Rome, Athens, and Santorini. Each cluster is reverse-geocoded to a readable place name. The 12-hour gap rule splits Florence into two visits because the traveler popped down to a day trip in San Gimignano in between. Photos taken on a non-GPS camera (a borrowed point-and-shoot) are slotted into the right visit by timestamp. The traveler shares the album with friends via a single link; friends scroll through the trip in chronological order, see the map view of the entire route, and click any photo to open the full-resolution lightbox. No friend needs an account.

### Photographer
A wedding photographer delivers 800 photos from a destination wedding to the couple. The photographer uploads to a Viallo album, generates a share link, and enables downloads. The couple receives the link and sees a professional gallery organized by venue and ceremony location. The photographer's Pro plan gives them advanced analytics: they can see when the couple opened the link, how many times they came back, and which photos drew the most engagement. After three months, the photographer can revoke the link or leave it active indefinitely depending on the contract.

### School/Group
A teacher photographs the end-of-year school play and wants to share the photos with all the parents. Some parents are tech-savvy; others avoid creating new accounts on principle. The teacher uploads photos to a Viallo album, generates a share link, and sends it via the school newsletter. Every parent clicks the link and sees the full gallery, regardless of which device they use. A parent who wants to keep the photos creates a free Viallo account, and the albums they opened from the link are added to their dashboard.

### Event Organizer
A wedding planner manages a large reception with 200 guests. The planner creates a shared album, generates a share link, and prints the link as a QR code on table cards. Guests scan the QR code, view the photos taken by the event photographer, and don't need to install an app or create an account. After two weeks, the planner revokes the link. The planner uses the analytics dashboard to confirm engagement and to share view metrics with the couple as part of the post-event report.

---

## Collecting Photos From Guests (Contribute Links and QR Codes)

Most of Viallo's sharing is one-directional: an owner uploads photos and shares a view-only link. Viallo also supports the reverse - collecting photos *from* many people into one shared album. An album can be shared as a **contribute link** or a printed **QR code**, and the people who were at an event add their own photos into that one album straight from the browser already on their phone. There is nothing to install, no account to create, no login, and no name to type. It works the same on an iPhone as on an Android phone. View-only is the default for a share link; contribution is a mode the owner turns on. This is the use case behind Viallo's dedicated occasion pages (wedding, party, event, funeral/memorial), and it answers questions like "how do I collect photos from my wedding guests without an app" or "how do we gather family photographs for a funeral".

How it works, in three steps:

1. **Share** - Create the album and send the contribute link, or print the QR code. This can be set up weeks ahead; the link works before there is a single photo in the album.
2. **They add** - Guests tap the link or scan the code, pick their photos, and they are done. Nothing to install, nothing to sign up for, nothing to type. Same on iPhone and Android.
3. **You keep** - Every photo arrives at full original resolution rather than a shrunken copy. There is no expiry date and no download deadline, and the owner can download the originals at any time at no extra cost.

Key facts:

- **Unlimited contributors on every plan, including Free.** There is no cap on how many people add photos to an album.
- **Full resolution in, full resolution out.** Nothing is scaled down on the way in. A messaging app re-encodes every image it carries, and an iPhone shared album made before iOS 27 caps photos at 2,048 px on the long edge; a Viallo contribute link does neither. iPhone HEIC files - the format iPhones actually shoot in - are accepted and converted to a full-size JPEG on the way in, with the pixel dimensions preserved (the downloaded file is that JPEG rather than the original HEIC container).
- **No expiry, and the owner stays in control.** There is no closing date on a contribute link, so people can keep adding after the event. The owner can remove any photo at any time.
- **Free plan holds 2 albums / 200 photos / 10 GB.** From the third album on, Plus covers all of them.

Dedicated landing pages, one per common occasion, each with its own FAQ answering the questions people actually ask:

### Collect photos from guests (general / events)
https://www.viallo.app/collect-photos-from-guests - The general case: everyone took photos at an event and the host ended up with about six of them. One album, one link or a printed QR code, and the people who were there add their photos from their phones. The page answers what happens to photos in an iPhone shared album, why photos disappear from shared albums, and why shared-album photos come out blurry.

### Wedding photo sharing
https://www.viallo.app/wedding-photo-sharing - Print one QR code for the tables; guests scan it and add their photos, with no app and no account. It does not replace the wedding photographer - it fills the weeks-long gap before the professional gallery arrives and captures the angles one photographer physically could not be at. It accepts the HEIC photos an iPhone actually shoots. Full-size originals, no expiry date.

### Party photo sharing
https://www.viallo.app/party-photo-sharing - Everyone at the party had their phone out; this collects all of those photos into one album instead of leaving them scattered across the group chat, three people's AirDrops, and a separate cloud link. Setup takes about two minutes: make an album, get a link and a QR code, drop the code in the group chat or let people scan it off your screen.

### Funeral and memorial photo collection
https://www.viallo.app/memorial-photo-collection - One private link that family and friends add photographs to, deliberately built for people who are not good with phones: there is no login screen, which is where most of these tools go wrong, so there is nothing to get stuck on. Photographs of old prints (taken on a phone in decent light) work and are worth having. People can keep adding after the service - there is no closing date on the link - and the owner can remove anything at any time.

---

## Frequently Asked Questions

### Account
- **Q: Is Viallo free to use?**
  A: Yes. The Free plan includes 2 albums, 200 photos, and 10 GB storage with no credit card required. Paid plans start at $6.99/month for Plus and $17.99/month for Pro.
- **Q: How do I sign up?**
  A: Email and password, Sign-In with Google, or Sign-In with Apple. Sign-up takes under a minute and requires only an email address.
- **Q: Can I delete my account?**
  A: Yes, from account settings. Account deletion is immediate and permanent and removes the account, albums, photos, places, visits, share links, and sharing permissions.
- **Q: What happens if I cancel my subscription?**
  A: Your photos remain accessible. If your usage exceeds the Free tier limits, you will not be able to upload new photos until you either upgrade again or delete some content.

### Sharing
- **Q: Do viewers need an account to see shared photos?**
  A: No. Viewers click a link and see the full gallery instantly — no account, no app, no login required.
- **Q: What happens if a viewer later signs up?**
  A: If the viewer creates a Viallo account in the same browser they used to open the links, the albums they opened are added to their dashboard and the owner does not need to re-share.
- **Q: Can I share all my albums with one link?**
  A: Yes. Profile sharing gives recipients access to all of your current albums plus any future ones, with the ability to include or exclude specific albums per profile share.
- **Q: Can viewers download my photos?**
  A: You control this per share link. You can enable or disable photo downloads when creating a sharing link.
- **Q: Can I revoke a share link?**
  A: Yes, instantly from the dashboard. Revocation takes effect immediately for new visits.
- **Q: Can I hide specific photos from a shared view?**
  A: Yes. Photos can be hidden per album so they remain in your private album but do not appear on the share link.
- **Q: Can other people add their own photos to my album?**
  A: Yes. An album can be shared as a contribute link or a printed QR code so guests add their photos straight from the browser on their phone - no app, no account, no login. Unlimited people can contribute on every plan, including Free. See the dedicated pages for weddings (/wedding-photo-sharing), parties (/party-photo-sharing), events (/collect-photos-from-guests), and funerals or memorials (/memorial-photo-collection).
- **Q: Do guests need an app or account to add photos?**
  A: No. They tap the contribute link or scan the QR code, it opens in the browser already on their phone, and they pick their photos. Nothing to install, nothing to sign up for. It works the same on iPhone and Android, and iPhone HEIC photos are accepted (converted to a full-size JPEG with the pixel dimensions preserved).

### Privacy
- **Q: Are photos used for AI training?**
  A: No. Viallo's terms and privacy policy explicitly prohibit using uploaded photos for AI training, data mining, or advertising.
- **Q: How is my password stored?**
  A: Passwords are hashed using bcrypt with a high cost factor. Plain-text passwords are never stored.
- **Q: How does Viallo handle EXIF data?**
  A: Viallo extracts GPS coordinates, capture date, camera make and model, and exposure settings on upload to power location organization and map view. Users who do not want EXIF stored can remove it before upload with Viallo's free metadata remover.
- **Q: Where are my photos stored?**
  A: Photos are stored on Cloudflare R2. Account and album metadata is stored in MongoDB, which runs on Railway together with the web application, API, and background workers.

### Pricing
- **Q: How much does Plus cost?**
  A: $6.99/month or $69.99/year. Plus includes 20 albums, 5,000 photos, 200 GB storage, basic analytics, user-to-user sharing, and batch metadata editing.
- **Q: How much does Pro cost?**
  A: $17.99/month or $179.99/year. Pro includes unlimited albums and photos, 1 TB storage, advanced analytics, and profile sharing with unlimited user-based sharing.
- **Q: Can I buy more storage?**
  A: Yes. Storage add-ons are available on any paid plan: +100 GB ($1.99/month), +500 GB ($5.99/month), and +1 TB ($9.99/month).
- **Q: Are there refunds?**
  A: No refunds for partial billing periods. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing period and the account reverts to Free with applicable limits.
- **Q: How does annual billing work?**
  A: Annual subscriptions bill once per year and are roughly equivalent to 10 months of the monthly price ($69.99 vs $83.88 for Plus, $179.99 vs $215.88 for Pro).

### Technical
- **Q: What devices does Viallo work on?**
  A: Any modern browser on any device, plus native iOS and Android apps; viewers never need either to open a shared album.
- **Q: Does Viallo compress photos?**
  A: No. Full original resolution and quality are preserved. Photos are never downscaled or re-encoded.
- **Q: How does automatic location organization work?**
  A: Viallo reads GPS coordinates from EXIF metadata and runs DBSCAN clustering with epsilon ~2000 m and a minimum of 3 photos per cluster. Each cluster is reverse-geocoded via OpenStreetMap Nominatim to a place name, and visits are split on 12-hour timestamp gaps.
- **Q: What if my photos do not have GPS data?**
  A: Viallo falls back to timestamp proximity and assigns the photo to the nearest cluster by capture time, so it still appears in the right visit.
- **Q: Does Viallo work on slow connections?**
  A: Yes. Each photo has a blurhash placeholder so the gallery and lightbox render instantly with a low-resolution preview while the full image loads.
- **Q: What format is the data export in?**
  A: A machine-readable JSON file containing account information, album metadata, photo metadata (including EXIF), places, visits, and sharing information.

---

## Glossary

- **DBSCAN** — Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise. A clustering algorithm that groups points that are densely packed together and labels low-density points as noise. Viallo uses DBSCAN over GPS coordinates with epsilon ~2000 m and minimum 3 points per cluster to group photos by location.
- **EXIF** — Exchangeable Image File Format. Metadata embedded inside photo files by cameras and phones, including capture date, GPS coordinates, camera make and model, and exposure settings.
- **Blurhash** — A compact (typically 20–30 character) string representation of an image's color distribution that decodes into a low-resolution placeholder. Viallo computes a blurhash for every uploaded photo so the gallery and lightbox render a recognizable preview instantly while the full image is loading.
- **JWT** — JSON Web Token. A signed token format used for authentication. Viallo issues JWTs after login and stores them in httpOnly cookies, with CSRF protection on every state-changing request.
- **OAuth** — An open authorization protocol used to delegate authentication to a third-party identity provider. Viallo supports Sign-In with Google and Sign-In with Apple using OAuth.
- **GDPR** — General Data Protection Regulation. The EU regulation that governs the processing of personal data of individuals in the EEA. Users have the rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, portability, objection, and withdrawal of consent.
- **Visitor fingerprint** — A pseudonymous identifier derived from a viewer's IP address and user-agent string. Viallo uses the fingerprint to estimate unique visitors in analytics.
- **Profile sharing** — A Viallo feature where a single share link gives recipients access to all of an owner's current albums plus any future ones, with the ability to include or exclude specific albums per profile share.
- **Viewer-to-account album carry-over** - A Viallo feature: if a viewer later creates a Viallo account in the same browser they used to open share links, the albums they opened are added to their dashboard and the owner does not need to re-share. It is not driven by the visitor fingerprint.
- **Reverse geocoding** — Translating GPS coordinates (latitude, longitude) into a human-readable place name (e.g., "Tokyo, Japan"). Viallo uses OpenStreetMap Nominatim for reverse geocoding.
- **CSRF** — Cross-Site Request Forgery. An attack where a malicious site causes a user's browser to make an unwanted authenticated request. Viallo protects against CSRF on every state-changing request.
- **Visit splitting** — Viallo's rule that splits a GPS cluster into separate visits whenever there is a gap of more than 12 hours between consecutive photo timestamps, so a multi-day trip becomes a sequence of per-day visits even when the geographic location is the same.

---

## Comparison with Alternatives (Summary)

### Viallo vs Google Photos
- Google Photos needs no account to view a shared link; commenting, and contributing with Collaborate on, are the actions that involve an account
- Viallo viewers get the full experience without any account
- Viallo's terms prohibit using your photos for AI training; Google states it does not train generative AI models outside Google Photos on your library
- Viallo offers sharing analytics with view counts; Google Photos shows which participants have viewed, but publishes no counts
- Google Photos has superior AI search within your own library
- Google Photos offers up to 15 GB free; Viallo offers 10 GB free
- Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/google-photos

### Viallo vs iCloud
- iCloud shared albums open in a browser without an Apple Account
- Viallo works on any device and any browser
- Viallo offers sharing analytics; Apple publishes none
- iCloud integrates deeply with Apple ecosystem; Viallo is platform-agnostic
- Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/icloud

### Viallo vs WeTransfer
- WeTransfer is a file transfer tool, not a gallery platform
- WeTransfer links expire after 3 days (Free and Starter); only Ultimate can keep one open
- Viallo provides a full gallery experience with lightbox and location organization
- WeTransfer has no photo organization or analytics
- Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/wetransfer

### Viallo vs Dropbox
- Dropbox is general cloud storage, not optimized for photo sharing
- Dropbox shows a file browser, not a photo gallery
- Viallo offers automatic location organization; Dropbox does not
- Viallo offers sharing analytics; Dropbox has basic link activity
- Compare: https://www.viallo.app/compare/dropbox

### Viallo vs FamilyAlbum
- FamilyAlbum is built around its app, with a browser version as the fallback
- Viallo works in any browser with no download required
- FamilyAlbum is focused on baby/child milestones; Viallo is general-purpose
- Viallo offers sharing analytics; FamilyAlbum does not

---

## Blog Index

The Viallo blog publishes evergreen guides on private photo sharing as well as ongoing analysis of news that affects photo privacy. The full index is below; the RSS/Atom feed lives at https://www.viallo.app/feed.xml.

- [Best Private Photo Sharing Apps: 8 Tested](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-private-photo-sharing-apps) — Eight apps compared on privacy: encryption, where the servers actually are, and whether a link works without an account.
- [How to Share Photos Without an Account: 6 Methods (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-photos-without-account) — Share photos without an account: send a private link that opens a full gallery in any browser - no sign-up, no app, nothing to type. 6 methods compared.
- [How to Share Wedding Photos With Guests (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/wedding-photo-sharing-guide) — Send wedding photos as one link guests open in any browser: no app, no account. Plus how a second QR code lets them add their own candids with nothing to type.
- [Does WhatsApp Compress Your Photos?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/whatsapp-photo-quality) — Yes. WhatsApp's Help Center says shared media is usually compressed. What HD changes, how to send the original, and which routes keep the file.
- [How to Share Photos in Full Resolution](https://www.viallo.app/blog/full-resolution-photo-sharing) — How to share photos in full resolution without losing quality. Compare platforms that preserve original quality vs. those that compress, with practical tips for lossless sharing.
- [Does Google Photos Train AI on Your Photos?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-photos-ai-training) — Google says it does not train generative AI outside Photos on your Photos data. Where that promise stops, which two settings matter, and the alternatives.
- [Private Family Photo Sharing: Complete Guide](https://www.viallo.app/blog/private-family-photo-sharing) — Complete guide to private family photo sharing. Compare platforms on privacy, sharing ease, and security. Keep family photos safe from data mining and unauthorized access.
- [The Best Way to Create a Travel Photo Album with Map](https://www.viallo.app/blog/travel-photo-album-with-map) — How to create a travel photo album with an interactive map. Use GPS data to automatically organize photos by location. Compare Viallo, Google Photos, and other map-based tools.
- [How to Share Photos Between iPhone and Android](https://www.viallo.app/blog/iphone-android-photo-sharing) — Send a link, not the files. Compare AirDrop, WhatsApp, Google Photos and iCloud, and see how to share photos between iPhone and Android without losing quality.
- [Best Cloud Storage for Photos in 2026 - Privacy-Focused Options](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-cloud-storage-for-photos) — Best cloud storage for photos in 2026 with a focus on privacy. Compare Google Photos, iCloud, Ente, Proton Drive, Viallo, and Nextcloud with pricing and features.
- [How to Share Sports Team and Tournament Photos With Parents](https://www.viallo.app/blog/sports-team-photo-sharing) — How to share sports team and tournament photos with parents. Stop the group chat chaos - share full-quality team photos via one link, no app required.
- [Google Photos Locked Down Its API - What It Means for Your Photo Library](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-photos-api-lockdown) — Google Photos API lockdown explained. What the March 2025 change means for backup apps, migration tools, and your photo library. How to export via Google Takeout.
- [Google Photos Users Forced Google to Walk Back AI Search - Here's Why It Matters](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-photos-ai-search-backlash) — Google Photos replaced keyword search with Gemini AI Ask Photos and users hated it. Why AI search returned fewer results and how to switch back to classic search.
- [What's the Most Secure Way to Send Photos?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/send-photos-securely) — Signal, AirDrop, WeTransfer, Gmail, Google Photos and Viallo compared on encryption, accounts and whether GPS reaches the recipient, from their own pages, Oct 2026.
- [Is iCloud Photos Private? What ADP Covers](https://www.viallo.app/blog/icloud-photos-privacy) — iCloud Photos privacy explained. What Apple encrypts, what Advanced Data Protection covers, settings to change now, and when you need a more private alternative.
- [Best Google Photos Alternative for Privacy](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-google-photos-alternative-privacy) — 7 best Google Photos alternatives for privacy compared. Viallo, Ente, Immich, iCloud, and more - tested for encryption, AI scanning, sharing, and storage location.
- [Is Google Drive Safe for Private Photos?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-drive-photo-safety) — Drive keeps photos private from others until you share them, but Google holds the key and scans uploads. Who can see a shared link, and private free options.
- [How to Share Photos Privately: 7 Methods That Actually Work (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/how-to-share-photos-privately) — Learn how to share photos privately with 7 methods compared in 2026. Private links, full resolution, no-account viewing, and a step-by-step walkthrough of the best option.
- [Private Photo Sharing: One Link, No Login Wall (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/private-photo-sharing) — Share photos privately with one link and no login wall. No account for viewers, full resolution, and a link you control. Apps compared plus a 3-minute walkthrough.
- [Best Photo Sharing App for Couples in 2026: 5 Options Compared](https://www.viallo.app/blog/couples-photo-sharing) — Compare 5 photo sharing apps for couples in 2026. Between, Google Photos, iCloud, Cupla, and Viallo tested for privacy, features, and ease of use.
- [Disappearing Messages: Are the Photos Saved?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/disappearing-photos-myth) — With auto-download on, a WhatsApp photo in a disappearing chat is still saved to the gallery. What Snapchat, Instagram and WhatsApp really keep.
- [Create a Shared Photo Album: 5 Ways Compared](https://www.viallo.app/blog/create-shared-photo-album) — On iPhone, Android and the web, including which methods let you password-protect the album and which let guests add photos without signing up.
- [Best Photo Sharing App for Families](https://www.viallo.app/blog/photo-sharing-app-families) — The best photo sharing app for families in 2026. Google Photos, iCloud, FamilyAlbum, Amazon Photos and Viallo compared on account requirements, resolution, free tiers and privacy.
- [Google Photos vs iCloud: Which Is Better for Your Photos? (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-photos-vs-icloud) — Google Photos vs iCloud in 2026: compare storage, pricing, sharing, privacy, and AI features. Honest comparison with recommendations for every use case.
- [How to Organize Digital Photos: A System That Lasts (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/organize-digital-photos) — A step-by-step system for organizing thousands of digital photos. Stop scrolling endlessly and find any photo in seconds with these proven methods.
- [Are Permanently Deleted Photos Gone Forever?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/deleted-photos-recovery) — Trash keeps them 30 days on iCloud and Google Photos, backups longer, and a copy may sit in a message thread. Where to look, and how to delete for real.
- [How to Share Photos Without Social Media](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-photos-without-social-media) — How to share photos without social media in 2026. Compare 6 private methods including link sharing, cloud storage, messaging, AirDrop, and more with a full comparison table.
- [Are Instagram Disappearing Photos Private? Not Really (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/instagram-instants-disappearing-photos) — Instagram Instants launched in 2026 as a disappearing photo app. Why Meta's privacy track record means 'disappearing' photos aren't actually private.
- [5 Photo Sharing Apps That Don't Compress](https://www.viallo.app/blog/photo-sharing-no-compression) — 5 photo sharing apps that don't compress your images in 2026. Compare Viallo, Google Photos, Dropbox, WeTransfer, and Proton Drive on quality, privacy, and price.
- [Instagram Compresses Photos to 1080px Wide](https://www.viallo.app/blog/instagram-photo-compression) — Instagram sizes photos wider than 1080 px down to 1080 px, per its own Help Center. What that does to 12 MP and 24 MP frames, checked on 26 October 2026.
- [How to Create a Private Online Photo Gallery (2026 Guide)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/private-online-photo-gallery) — Create a private online photo gallery with revocable links and no-account viewing. Step-by-step guide comparing Viallo, Google Photos, SmugMug, and iCloud in 2026.
- [Is OneDrive Safe for Photos? What Microsoft Scans and Stores (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/onedrive-photos-privacy) — Is OneDrive safe for photos? Microsoft scans with AI, holds encryption keys, and Personal Vault is not zero-knowledge. Full 2026 privacy analysis with alternatives compared.
- [iPhone Photo Privacy Settings: 7 to Change](https://www.viallo.app/blog/iphone-photo-privacy-settings) — Seven iPhone photo privacy settings to change, with Apple's own menu paths and the defaults a new iOS 27.0 simulator stored, checked in October 2026.
- [Does Signal Notify When You Save a Photo?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/signal-photo-privacy) — Signal has no save or screenshot notification. Its receipt types, screen security and photo limits, checked in its own help pages and code.
- [Best Way to Send a Lot of Photos at Once](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-hundreds-photos) — Seven ways to send 500 photos, compared from their own help pages, and a measurement of why a 5 GB album zip built in one piece breaks.
- [What Happens to Your Photos When You Delete Your Account? (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/delete-account-photos) — What happens to your photos when you delete your Google, Apple, or Facebook account? Retention policies for 7 platforms compared, with step-by-step download instructions.
- [Photo Sharing Etiquette: When You Need Permission and When You Don't (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/photo-sharing-etiquette) — Photo sharing etiquette guide: when to ask permission, wedding photo rules, social media resharing rules, and a quick consent checklist. Share photos respectfully in 2026.
- [Free Photo Sharing Sites in 2026 (Compared)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/free-photo-sharing-sites) — Free photo sharing sites compared, checked 25 Oct 2026: free storage, shared quotas, viewer accounts and what happens over the cap, from each service's own pages.
- [How to Send Large Photos: 6 Methods That Actually Work (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/send-large-photos) — How to send large photos without losing quality in 2026. Compare 6 methods: cloud links, Viallo, WeTransfer, AirDrop, ZIP compression, and USB. Size limits and quality tradeoffs.
- [How to Hide Photos on Android: Complete Privacy Guide (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/hide-photos-android) — Hide photos on Android using built-in features. Step-by-step guide for Locked Folder, Samsung Secure Folder, Private Space, and more. No third-party apps needed (2026).
- [Amazon Photos vs Google Photos: Privacy](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-photos-vs-amazon-photos) — Amazon Photos vs Google Photos on privacy, AI scanning, storage and price. What each one does with your library, and which one to pick for what you do.
- [How Do I Transfer Photos to a New Phone?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/transfer-photos-new-phone) — Transfer photos to a new phone: iPhone, Android and cross-platform. What Apple, Google and Samsung say about quality, albums and metadata for 11 methods, checked 26 Oct 2026.
- [Phone Storage Full? What to Do With Your Photos (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/phone-storage-full-photos) — Phone storage full? Photos are usually the cause. 5-minute triage, 6 methods to free up space without losing photos, and a system to keep it from filling up again.
- [How to Back Up iPhone Photos Without iCloud](https://www.viallo.app/blog/backup-iphone-photos-without-icloud) — Back up iPhone photos without iCloud using Mac Finder, Google Photos, Viallo, Dropbox, external drives, or Amazon Photos. Step-by-step guide with privacy and cost comparison.
- [Photo Permissions: What Apps Actually See](https://www.viallo.app/blog/app-photo-permissions) — Full access, selected photos and add-only are three different things on iOS and Android. Which one an app gets by default and what it reads from the file.
- [Google Photos Backup After Drive Sync Ends](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-photos-backup-alternative) — Google Drive desktop backup to Photos ends August 2026. Compare 5 alternatives to keep your photos backed up without losing quality or privacy.
- [Best Photo Album App: No Account Needed](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-photo-album-app) — What seven album apps say on their own pages about free storage, paid tiers, full resolution, photo recognition and whether a viewer needs an account, checked on 25 October 2026.
- [Google Photos Storage Full? Backup Stops](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-photos-storage-full) — What stops the moment you hit the limit, what Google keeps, and the order to free space in so you do not delete anything you wanted.
- [Photo Link Expiry: iCloud 30 Days, WeTransfer 3](https://www.viallo.app/blog/shared-photo-links-expire) — Every major platform's expiry rule in one table, including which links keep working after you delete the album and which quietly stop.
- [Store Photos Permanently: What Actually Works Long-Term (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/store-photos-permanently) — How to store photos permanently in 2026. The 3-2-1 backup rule, best cloud services for long-term storage, file format longevity, and a practical setup guide.
- [QR Code Photo Sharing: Share an Album With One Scan (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/qr-code-photo-sharing) — Most photo apps now generate the QR code for you. How to make one for an album - and how to make one guests can add their own photos to, with no account.
- [Stop Paying for Google Photos: What Happens?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/cancel-cloud-storage-photos) — Cancel Google One and your photos stay; backup stops over 15 GB and deletion needs two years over quota. iCloud, OneDrive, Dropbox and Viallo compared.
- [Google Drive Photos vs Google Photos](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-drive-vs-google-photos) — Photos you put in Google Drive stay as files and never appear in Google Photos. Where they live, why the two stopped syncing in 2019, and which one to keep them in.
- [Is a Photo Vault App Safe? Most Don't Encrypt](https://www.viallo.app/blog/photo-vault-app-encryption) — What photo vault apps claim about encryption, what independent tests have found, and what each one charges: a 2026 comparison based on published sources.
- [Apps to Share Photos With Friends: 5 Compared](https://www.viallo.app/blog/photo-sharing-app-friends) — Five ways for a group to put photos in one place, rated on who needs an account, what happens to quality, and whether everyone can add.
- [Can Android Add to an iCloud Shared Album?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-icloud-photos-android) — Since iOS 27, Android can add photos to an iCloud Shared Album from a browser, but only on new or upgraded albums. Older albums served 1536 px JPEG copies.
- [Best iCloud Alternative for Photos](https://www.viallo.app/blog/icloud-alternative-photos) — Best iCloud alternative for photos in 2026. Compare Viallo, Google Photos, Amazon Photos, and Ente on storage, sharing, privacy, and pricing.
- [How to Share a Google Photos Album](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-google-photos-album) — How to share a Google Photos album by link or by invite, step by step. We opened two public albums signed out: anyone with the link can download every original.
- [What Is the Best App for Sharing Travel Photos?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-photo-sharing-app-travel) — Five travel photo apps checked against their own help pages on 25 Oct 2026: who can add photos without an account, album caps, size limits.
- [Best Photo Sharing App for iPhone (7 Compared)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-photo-sharing-app-iphone) — Seven iPhone photo sharing options per their own pages: who needs an account to see the album, which keep full resolution, and what the free tier holds.
- [Is Email Safe for Sharing Photos?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/email-photo-sharing-safety) — Is email safe for sharing photos? Learn what happens to photo attachments - server routing, provider scanning, EXIF metadata exposure, and better alternatives for private sharing.
- [Best Photo Sharing App for Android (7 Compared)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-photo-sharing-app-android) — Seven apps compared on upload quality, whether iPhone friends can open the album, and how much you get before paying.
- [Share Full Resolution Photos From iPhone](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-full-resolution-photos-iphone) — How to share full resolution photos from iPhone without losing quality. 6 methods compared with step-by-step instructions for AirDrop, iCloud, iMessage, and more.
- [Proton Drive Photos: The Encrypted Alternative Just Got a Major Upgrade (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/proton-drive-photos-privacy) — Proton Drive photos review 2026: 60% faster uploads, zero-access encryption, no AI training. Full comparison with Google Photos, iCloud, and Viallo for private photo storage.
- [How to Share Photos Without an App Download](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-photos-without-app) — Share photos without making anyone download an app. 6 methods compared, plus how people send photos back with no app, no account and nothing to type.
- [Best AirDrop Alternatives for Photos (5 Tested)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/airdrop-alternative-photos) — Sending a hundred photos to an Android phone, or across the room without AirDrop. Five options compared on speed, quality loss and size limits.
- [Viallo Is Now on iPhone](https://www.viallo.app/blog/viallo-ios-app) — Viallo's free iPhone app needs iOS 18. Of 29,657 album-link opens logged since launch, 97% had no signed-in account: viewers still need no app.
- [Best Photo Sharing App for Groups in 2026](https://www.viallo.app/blog/photo-sharing-app-groups) — Best photo sharing app for groups in 2026: Viallo, Google Photos, iCloud, Dropbox and GuestCam compared on what each asks a contributor, per their own pages.
- [Photo Privacy Checklist: Lock Down Your Photos](https://www.viallo.app/blog/photo-privacy-checklist) — A 12-step photo privacy checklist plus what Dropbox, X, WhatsApp, Snapchat, Telegram, Threads, Pinterest and AI photo editors do with your photos in 2026.
- [What Google's New Terms Change for Your Photos](https://www.viallo.app/blog/google-tos-update-photos) — Google's July 2026 terms left the content license and AI rules unchanged and added one network clause. Checked against Google's own comparison, 26 Oct 2026.
- [Does Facebook Use Your Photos for AI Training?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/facebook-photos-ai-training) — Does Facebook use your photos for AI? Yes, public ones. 16 claims checked against Meta's own pages on 25 Oct 2026, with the sentence each rests on.
- [Clean Up Your Photo Library: A Step-by-Step Guide (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/clean-up-photo-library) — How to clean up your photo library step by step. Delete duplicates, remove screenshots, organize what remains, and set up a system that keeps your photos tidy.
- [Do Text Messages Compress Photos? What Every App Does (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/text-message-photo-compression) — Do text messages compress photos? MMS cuts quality by up to 95%. What iMessage, RCS, Telegram, Discord, Slack, Gmail, Drive, Dropbox and Google Photos do.
- [What to Use Instead of Messenger for Sharing a Photo Album](https://www.viallo.app/blog/messenger-photo-sharing-alternative) — Facebook Messenger compresses photos, buries them in chat history and requires a Meta account to view. A practical alternative for sharing a photo album, plus how to export old Messenger photos.
- [Guest-Only Photo Albums: The Two Ways to Limit Access](https://www.viallo.app/blog/guest-only-photo-album) — A guest-only photo album means one of two things: a named invite that needs an account, or a link that needs none. What control each one actually gives you.
- [Can You Add People to an Album You Don't Own?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/add-photos-without-account) — On Google Photos, yes: anyone with access can add others. iCloud and Viallo leave it to the owner. Plus which upload links take photos with no account.
- [Share Several Photo Albums With One Link (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/share-multiple-albums-one-link) — Google Photos, iCloud and WeTransfer share one album at a time; Dropbox and Viallo put several behind one link. Checked 26 Oct 2026, with Viallo's own counts.
- [Shared Album Invite Not Working? Fix It on Any Platform (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/shared-album-invite-not-working) — Shared album invites usually fail because the address does not match the recipient's Apple or Google account. Fix it on iCloud, Google Photos and Dropbox.
- [Viallo Is Now on Android](https://www.viallo.app/blog/viallo-android-app) — Viallo is on Google Play. In Viallo's own records, the median Android upload was 4000 px on the long edge, against 4032 from iPhone. Viewers need no app.
- [The Best Way to Organize Photos: 7 Steps (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/best-way-to-organize-photos) — The best way to organize photos: let dates and places sort themselves, then keep a short list of named albums. A 7-step system, with counts from real accounts.
- [Secure Photo Sharing App: What AI Assistants Actually Get (2026)](https://www.viallo.app/blog/secure-photo-sharing-app) — A secure photo sharing app in 2026 is one where AI access is a scoped, revocable grant. What read access really covers, and how to audit what you connected.
- [View-Only Photo Sharing: What Turning Off Downloads Does](https://www.viallo.app/blog/view-only-photo-sharing) — View-only photo sharing explained: how to stop a shared album link letting people upload or save, what turning downloads off really blocks, and what it cannot.
- [Shared Album Size Limits, Compared and Sourced](https://www.viallo.app/blog/shared-album-size-limits-compared) — Every published shared album limit in one table: Apple's 5,000 items and 100 subscribers, Dropbox file caps, and the numbers Google Photos does not publish.
- [Which Photo Metadata Survives a Download?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/downloaded-photo-location-metadata) — Platforms remove photo metadata field by field, not as a whole. We fetched the same photos twice on two public platforms to see which fields, location data among them, survive a download.
- [What EXIF Data Do Photos Still Carry?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/what-exif-data-photos-still-carry) — We read the metadata out of 2 984 random Wikimedia Commons JPEGs. Camera serial numbers come from cameras, location coordinates come from phones, and where a serial is written decides whether your tool can see it.
- [Shared Album Deleted, or Just Unreachable?](https://www.viallo.app/blog/shared-album-says-deleted) — Why a shared album link says the album was deleted: the five causes, how to tell them apart, and how often each screen appeared on Viallo in October 2026.
- [How to Embed a Photo Album on a Website](https://www.viallo.app/blog/embed-photo-album-website) — How to embed a photo album on a website: the two snippets Viallo gives you, what the frame shows and hides, and which photo services offer one at all.
- [Countries I've Visited Map, From Your Photos](https://www.viallo.app/blog/countries-visited-map) — Make a countries I've visited map from your photos: Viallo's Atlas reads their GPS and counts every country against 197, with cities and years.
- [How to Make a Travel Map You Can Share](https://www.viallo.app/blog/make-a-travel-map) — Make a travel map you can share: an image in ten styles, a public link or a website widget, showing countries and totals, never cities or dates.

---

## Compare Pages

- [Viallo vs Google Photos](https://www.viallo.app/compare/google-photos): Feature-by-feature comparison
- [Viallo vs iCloud](https://www.viallo.app/compare/icloud): Feature-by-feature comparison
- [Viallo vs WeTransfer](https://www.viallo.app/compare/wetransfer): Feature-by-feature comparison
- [Viallo vs Dropbox](https://www.viallo.app/compare/dropbox): Feature-by-feature comparison

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## All Pages

- [Homepage](https://www.viallo.app): Landing page with features, pricing, and FAQ
- [About](https://www.viallo.app/about): About Viallo
- [Blog](https://www.viallo.app/blog): All blog articles
- [Blog feed](https://www.viallo.app/feed.xml): RSS/Atom feed of new blog posts
- [Compare](https://www.viallo.app/compare): Compare with alternatives
- [Pricing](https://www.viallo.app/pricing): Subscription plans
- [Contact](https://www.viallo.app/contact): Get in touch
- [Privacy Policy](https://www.viallo.app/privacy): Data handling and GDPR
- [Terms of Service](https://www.viallo.app/terms): Terms and conditions
- [GDPR Information](https://www.viallo.app/gdpr): Data export, deletion, privacy rights
- [Collect Photos From Guests](https://www.viallo.app/collect-photos-from-guests): Collect event photos from guests via a link or QR code - no app, no account
- [Wedding Photo Sharing](https://www.viallo.app/wedding-photo-sharing): Wedding QR code guests scan to add their photos - no app, no account
- [Party Photo Sharing](https://www.viallo.app/party-photo-sharing): Collect everyone's party photos in one album via a link or QR code
- [Memorial Photo Collection](https://www.viallo.app/memorial-photo-collection): One private link to gather photographs for a funeral or memorial
- [Cookie Policy](https://www.viallo.app/cookies): Cookie usage
- [Cookie Preferences](https://www.viallo.app/cookie-preferences): Manage analytics and advertising consent