A Google Photos desktop app for Mac, Windows and Linux
Google does not ship a Google Photos app for computers, and its help pages send you to photos.google.com. A Pake window can give that site its own icon and window on Mac, Windows and Linux, so browsing, albums, sharing, manual uploads and downloads work as they do in a browser tab. It does not back up a folder in the background, which is what many people searching for a desktop app want, and Google's own folder backup from a computer needs a Chromium-based browser tab or web app to stay open.
What Google offers on a computer
Google's Get started page names only photos.google.com for computer use. Its backup help lists three ways to add photos from a computer: Import photos from the Create and add photos button, dragging files onto the page, and Back up folders, which Google says needs "a Chromium-based browser such as Chrome or Edge" and the Google Photos tab kept open, or "the Photos Web App running". If you close the tab, folders stop backing up. The same page gives upload limits of 200 MB or 200 MP per photo and 10 GB per video, and lists JPG, HEIC, PNG, MP4 and MOV among supported types.
Drive for desktop used to cover the background case. Google's Drive for desktop page says that from June 15, 2026 new backup folders can no longer be configured in Drive for desktop, that starting August 10, 2026 it ends support for Google Photos backup, and that items already backed up remain in Google Photos. That date has passed, and the page asks users to reselect their backup folders in Google Photos.
What a Pake window does and does not do
A Pake build of photos.google.com is the same web page in a window of its own. It gives you:
- an icon in the Dock, taskbar or launcher, and a place in the window switcher
- the library, albums, search and sharing, as the site offers them
- uploads through the file dialog and by dragging files in
- downloads into a folder you choose
It does not give you a folder watcher. Back up folders is a feature of the web page in a supported browser, and Google's page says an unsupported one shows "Browser not supported". Pake on Mac and Linux uses WebKit, which is not Chromium. On Windows it uses WebView2, which is built on Chromium but is an embedded view, not Chrome or Edge. Whether Google offers the option in any of these has not been tested, so look for it in the Create and add photos menu before counting on it.
If background folder backup is the goal, use Chrome or Edge with the Photos tab open, or install the site as an app from Chrome's menu, which the Gmail post describes for Gmail.
Build it with the CLI
After setting up the CLI, which needs Node.js 20.9 or later and Rust 1.85 or later, run:
pake https://photos.google.com --name "Google Photos" --width 1300 --height 850 --download-dir '~/Pictures/Google Photos'--name sets the app name, and on Linux it becomes lowercase with hyphens. --width and --height set the starting window, 1200 by 780 by default. --download-dir is covered below. The first build sets up the environment and takes longer than later ones. On Mac the output is a DMG, on Windows an installer, and on Linux .deb and .AppImage on Debian and Ubuntu or .rpm and .AppImage on Fedora; --targets picks one, as listed in the CLI options. These flags were checked against Pake CLI 3.17.8.
Build it with the Pake desktop app
The Pake desktop app needs no Node.js, Rust or compiler. Paste photos.google.com into the field on the Create tab, keep or change the name, and click Create App. Create an app describes the fields. It runs on macOS 14 or later, Windows on x64 and ARM64, and Arch-based Linux such as Omarchy on x86_64; install has the requirements. On Ubuntu or Fedora, use the CLI.
The desktop app's manual lists no download-folder setting, so the download folder below is a CLI option. Leave Incognito off, or every launch signs you out.
Sign in with Google
This is the step to test first. Google's OAuth policy says a developer must not direct an authorization request to an embedded user-agent under the developer's control, and a Pake app is a window around the system web view. Pake's FAQ says Google properties may fail to sign in even with --new-window or --multi-window, and calls that provider policy, not a packaging bug. Google sign-in in a web app lists what to read and check, including how pop-ups behave: sign-in pages stay in the current window on Mac and Linux and open as pop-ups on Windows.
If Google refuses, a Pake build of Photos cannot work, and the browser route is the answer. The same limit applies to Gmail and Google Calendar.
Uploads and drag and drop
The upload button opens the system file dialog, since the page uses an ordinary file input. In Photos, choose Create and add photos, then Import photos, pick files and confirm.
Dragging files in needs no flag, because the page handles the drop itself, as it does in a browser. Drop one file on the window and see whether the upload starts, then drop one onto an album, which Google's page says uploads it to that album in a browser.
Test with a large video too, up to Google's 10 GB limit, and leave the app open until the page shows the upload finished.
Downloads
In Photos on a computer, Google says to select a photo or video, click More, then Download, on its download page. For the whole library it points to Google's data export.
Pake saves downloads to the system Downloads folder unless you set --download-dir. The docs say it applies to both link downloads and native browser downloads. Use an absolute path, or a quoted ~/path so ~ resolves to the home of whoever runs the app. Missing folders are created on the first download, relative paths are rejected, and an inaccessible folder makes the download fail instead of saving somewhere else. To change the folder, rebuild.
How the window works underneath
A Pake app is a Tauri shell drawing the page in the system web view: WKWebView on Mac, WebView2 on Windows, WebKitGTK on Linux. How Pake works walks through the build. The page is Google's own, so Pake adds none of Photos' features and cannot remove its limits. The default user agent is Safari-style on Mac and Linux and Chrome-style on Windows. Changing --user-agent is not a supported way past the embedded-browser rule.
Check that it works
Run these in order, using a copy of a few files rather than your only originals:
- Sign in, quit the app and reopen it. You should still be signed in.
- Upload one photo with Import photos, then one by dragging it in.
- Open Create and add photos and see whether Back up folders is listed. If it is, back up a small folder, then close the window and confirm nothing new uploads.
- Download a photo with More, Download, and confirm it lands in the folder you set.
- Play a short video from your own library, with sound, in full screen. Video support depends on the system engine's codecs, so test the formats you actually have, such as MP4 from a phone. On Linux, the FAQ notes that WebKitGTK 2.52 and later keep hardware acceleration for video, and older versions use compatibility flags that can affect playback.
If clicks or typing do nothing on some pure Wayland compositors such as niri, the FAQ suggests PAKE_LINUX_WEBKIT_SAFE_MODE=0, and =1 for a blank window.
Two Google accounts
Google lets you switch accounts inside a browser session. In a Pake app, two accounts mean two apps with different names, which the two accounts guide explains. In the desktop app, Add Another Account in My Apps copies an app and starts it signed out.
FAQ
Is there an official Google Photos desktop app?
Google's help pages describe photos.google.com for computers and do not list a Mac, Windows or Linux app.
Can a Pake app back up a folder automatically?
Not by itself. Google's folder backup is a feature of the web page in a Chromium-based browser, and it stops when the tab closes.
Does Drive for desktop still back up to Google Photos?
Google's page says support ends on August 10, 2026.
Will it work on Ubuntu with the Pake desktop app?
No. The desktop app supports Arch-based Linux on x86_64, and Ubuntu uses the CLI.