Migration

How to Download All Your Galleries Before Leaving Pic-Time

Download while you are still paying, check every gallery, and cancel last. Pic-Time's own help centre explains why the order matters.

Updated 17 September 2026

Leaving Pic-Time is mostly a download job.

The risk is doing it in the wrong order.

Pic-Time's help centre states that photographer downloads from a gallery's Photos & Media tab are not available on Free plans. Its cancel article says a cancelled account keeps its remaining paid days and then reverts to a free plan. Put those two together and the rule is simple: every gallery you want must be on your own drive before the paid period ends.

This guide covers that export in order: sort what you have, download gallery by gallery, handle archived galleries, check the files, and only then cancel. It ends with where the photos can go next and who should not leave Pic-Time at all. For the full move, including link swaps and what does not come over, read how to switch from Pic-Time.

The safe order, at a glance

Each step exists because of a rule Pic-Time publishes.

Step	What you do	Why, per Pic-Time
1. Sort	List every gallery and mark the ones that exist nowhere else.	Downloads are per gallery, so a short list saves hours.
2. Request archived galleries	Start the older galleries first.	Archived media has to be packaged before it can be downloaded.
3. Download the rest	Work through the list on a computer.	iOS in-app browsers do not allow ZIP downloads.
4. Check	Open files from each download and tick it off.	After the plan drops to Free, downloading from Photos & Media is not available.
5. Cancel	Cancel only when the list is complete.	Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current subscription period.

Step 1: Sort your galleries before downloading anything

Open your Pic-Time dashboard and write down every gallery. A plain spreadsheet with four columns is enough: gallery name, upload year, password, and whether the photos exist anywhere else.

The last column decides how much work this is. If a job is still in your Lightroom Classic catalog, or its finished JPEGs sit on your own drives, you do not need Pic-Time's copy. Download only the galleries you cannot rebuild from your own files.

Also note anything else you want to keep from Pic-Time, such as which photos a client chose or the details of past orders. A photo download does not carry those notes, so record them while you can still see them.

Step 2: Download one gallery at a time

Pic-Time documents photographer downloads per gallery. We found no Pic-Time help article that describes exporting every gallery in an account in one action, so plan for a gallery-by-gallery job. Pic-Time's paid migration service does not help here either: its FAQ says it is only available for galleries coming in from Pixieset.

The steps, as Pic-Time's photo archive article gives them:

Select the gallery from the main dashboard.
Open the Photos & Media tab.
Checkmark one image to open the selection bar, or click Select All.
Click Share photos, then Download.
For an archived gallery, click Prepare & Notify Me. Pic-Time emails you when the download is ready.

Pic-Time's Pic-Time 2.0 download article confirms the Photos & Media route and states that the feature is not available on Free plans.

Use a computer. Pic-Time's own advice for phones points to the gallery itself or its mobile app, and a separate article says iOS in-app browsers do not allow ZIP file downloads.

Step 3: Start archived galleries early

Older galleries are not always ready to download straight away. Pic-Time's unarchive article sets the window by upload date.

Gallery uploaded	Immediately downloadable for	After that
Before December 2024	The first year after upload	Packaged on request before download
December 2024 onward	The first three years after upload	Packaged on request before download

Packaging takes time, and Pic-Time gives two figures depending on where the request starts.

Request made from	Packaging time Pic-Time states
Photos & Media section (photographer)	Around 4 hours
General figure in the unarchive article	4 to 15 hours

One warning from the photo archive article: a status bar appears while a gallery is being de-archived, and cancelling it also cancels the de-archive. Leave it running.

In practice, request every archived gallery on your list first. Then download the recent ones while the older ones are being packaged.

Step 4: Check every download before you cancel

A download that failed quietly is the one you find out about too late.

Unzip each download and open a few files from the start, middle and end.
Compare the photo count with what the gallery shows on Pic-Time.
Copy the files to a second drive before you tick the gallery off.
Keep the spreadsheet row open until both checks pass.

When every row is ticked, you are ready for the last step. Not before.

Step 5: Cancel last, and know what happens next

Pic-Time's pricing page says downgrades and cancellations take effect at the end of the current subscription period. Its cancel article says you keep the remaining days before the account reverts to a free plan. Those remaining days are the end of your download window.

What Pic-Time states happens after that:

Situation	What Pic-Time states
Account on a Free plan	Downloading gallery media from Photos & Media is not available.
Plan drops below your stored amount	Galleries above the new storage limit are permanently deleted, oldest galleries first.
Free plan with 3 GB, no logins	Galleries are marked for deletion after 60 days of inactivity, then deleted after a 7-day warning countdown if no action is taken.

The storage limit each downgrade lands on, per Pic-Time's downgrade article:

Downgrade	New storage limit
Advanced to Professional	100 GB
Professional to Beginner	20 GB
Beginner to Free, account under 3 months old	10 GB
Beginner to Free, account 3 months or older	3 GB

How long Pic-Time waits before that deletion is not stated the same way across its help articles, so this page gives no waiting period. It does not change the plan. Once the account is on Free, the download route is closed anyway, so the only safe window is the paid one.

Where the photos go next

clientgallery.io has no Pic-Time importer. The one-click whole-account import reads Pixieset only. Your downloaded Pic-Time galleries come back in one of two ways.

Route	Best for	How it works
Web uploader	Galleries you only have as Pic-Time downloads	Create a gallery in the studio and drop in the JPG or PNG files. They are resized in the browser before upload.
Lightroom Classic plugin	Jobs still in your catalog	Publish proofs straight from the catalog, then pull client picks back in when they are sent.

Hosted photos are proof JPEGs sized for fast viewing, so the new gallery is a delivery copy, not a backup. Keep the Pic-Time downloads and your masters on your own drives.

The numbers that matter for a move:

Item	clientgallery.io
Price	10 $/month or 100 $/year, one plan
Free account	1 gallery and 5 GB, enough to test one job
Photos per gallery	1,000 under fair use; a bigger Pic-Time gallery becomes two galleries
Proofs per paid account	250 GB under fair use
Full-resolution handoff	Paid plan: a ZIP per gallery, live 3 days per handoff, re-uploadable, 100 GB of live ZIPs per account
Hosted gallery expiry	None while the account exists

Old Pic-Time links cannot be redirected by anyone but Pic-Time. The answer on whether switching breaks old client links covers how to sequence the new links.

Who should keep Pic-Time

Downloading everything is sensible either way. Leaving is not right for every studio.

You earn from the store. clientgallery.io has no print store and no product ordering. If print and album sales through your galleries are real revenue, stay.
You deliver RAW files or master video. clientgallery.io hosts JPEGs and does not store either.
Several people need their own logins. There is no seat model here. A two-person studio shares one account.
You live in a CRM tied to your gallery. clientgallery.io is delivery and proofing only.

If none of those apply, Pic-Time vs clientgallery.io sets Pic-Time's plans beside the one flat plan.

Sources

Every Pic-Time step, figure and policy above comes from these first-party pages. Where Pic-Time shows only a relative update date, it is given as shown on the fetch day.

Pic-Time Help Center, "How are photos accessible from cloud storage (photo archive)", shown as updated over 2 weeks ago on 17 September 2026, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/7916652-how-are-photos-accessible-from-cloud-storage-photo-archive
Pic-Time Help Center, "How can I download my gallery media in Pic-Time 2.0", updated 28 April 2026, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/11402965-how-can-i-download-my-gallery-media-in-pic-time-2-0
Pic-Time Help Center, "How do I unarchive an older gallery", shown as updated over 2 weeks ago on 17 September 2026, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/8951337-how-do-i-unarchive-an-older-gallery
Pic-Time Help Center, "Downloading zip files on iOS limitation", updated 25 April 2025, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/7905084-downloading-zip-files-on-ios-limitation
Pic-Time Help Center, "How do I cancel my subscription", updated 1 June 2026, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/7913370-how-do-i-cancel-my-subscription
Pic-Time Help Center, "How do I downgrade my plan and how will my account be affected", shown as updated over 3 weeks ago on 17 September 2026, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/7905681-how-do-i-downgrade-my-plan-and-how-will-my-account-be-affected
Pic-Time Help Center, "Why was my account set to be deleted", dated 18 June 2025, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/11604933-why-was-my-account-set-to-be-deleted
Pic-Time Help Center, "Gallery Migration Service FAQ", updated 5 August 2026, fetched 17 September 2026, https://help.pic-time.com/en/articles/7916611-gallery-migration-service-faq
Pic-Time pricing page (undated), fetched 17 September 2026, https://www.pic-time.com/pricing
clientgallery.io product behaviour (single plan price, free account limits, fair-use ceilings, full-resolution ZIP window, web uploader formats, Lightroom Classic plugin, Pixieset-only import), checked 17 September 2026, https://clientgallery.io/

Frequently asked

Can I download all my Pic-Time galleries at once?

We found no Pic-Time help article that describes exporting every gallery in one action. Pic-Time documents downloads per gallery: open the Photos & Media tab, use Select All, then Share photos and Download.

Can I download my galleries after my Pic-Time plan drops to Free?

Plan on no. Pic-Time's Pic-Time 2.0 download article states the feature is not available on Free plans, and its cancel article says a cancelled account reverts to a free plan after the remaining paid days.

Why does an old Pic-Time gallery not download straight away?

Pic-Time says galleries uploaded before December 2024 are immediately downloadable for their first year, and later ones for their first three years. After that, media is packaged first: around 4 hours when requested from Photos & Media, and 4 to 15 hours in general.

What happens to my galleries if I downgrade without downloading?

Pic-Time's downgrade article says galleries above the new storage limit are permanently deleted, oldest first. Its help articles do not describe the waiting period the same way, so download before you downgrade rather than counting on one.

Does Pic-Time's migration service move galleries out?

No. Pic-Time's migration FAQ says its paid service is only available for Pixieset galleries coming into Pic-Time. Getting galleries out means downloading them yourself.

Can clientgallery.io import my Pic-Time galleries?

No. There is no Pic-Time importer; the one-click import reads Pixieset only. Upload your downloaded galleries with the web uploader, or publish jobs still in your catalog with the Lightroom Classic plugin.

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