Google Photos Export Organizer

This tool is paired with this guide for exporting your Google Photos if you need more help.

The program will help you:

• Extract and merge your Google Photos export from Google Takeout.
• Organize your photos into folders by year and month.
• Optionally rename your photos to a year-month-day hour:minute:second number.extension naming convention
• Fix all file created and modified dates as they are organized.
• Optionally copy all available metadata provided by Google Takeout in .json files back into the image/video files.
• Remind you to clean up after processing.

Planned Additions

• Allow optionally just fixing file dates and metadata in-place without moving the files.

After downloading the correct file for your computer, you will need to exract the contents before you can run the program. Once you have extracted the program, find the GooglePhotosExportOrganizer executable within and double-click it to run the program.

Once the program is open, simply follow the instructions within.

Q: What language will ensure the best compatibility with my Google Photos export?

A: English is the only automatically-supported language at this time. Google Photos exports from other languages may run into problems until we figure out a good way to add international support.

Q: The Extract process failed to extract all my .zip files! What can I do?

A: We recommend separating your .zip files that failed into a separate folder and re-running the app on that folder with the output set to the original output folder that worked. This should extract the rest of the files correctly, and we're working on a fix for a future update.

Q: The Extract process has been running for more than X hours, but there are still some .zip files that have not been extracted... What should I do?

A: You probably have a lot of .zip files, so something probably just went wrong during the process and the application didn't tell you. Stop the process (may require closing & restarting the app) and follow the instructions in the previous answer.

Q: After running the Organize process, there are a lot of files left in the original Google Photos folder! What's going on?

A: The Google Photos Export Organizer app uses .json medata files provided in the Google Photos export to identify what files to move. Typically, files without .json files associated with them are edited versions of the original file and might have a number after them indicating that they are duplicates. These files are left in the original folder so you can check and organize them manually yourself if you wish, but the original files with the associated .json files should be correctly organized!

Q: I checked the files left in the Google Photos folder, and they have .json files but were not moved! What's wrong with them?

A: This likely has to do with the problem of only English being automatically supported, specifically US English. If you open some of your .json files in a text editor, you should be able to find a photoTakenDate entry, and within that a formatted entry. The code attempts to parse that formatted value directly into a JavaScript Date object, which unfortunately only recognizes certain formats of date and time, and typically only in English. We have an idea of how to fix it, but will need a bit of time before we can test international dates.
One option in the meantime is to change your Google interface to English before running your export. It's far from ideal, but it might make this app work for you!