Google Takeout to OneDrive: Unpack the Zips Without Downloading Them

Takeout can add a Google Photos export to OneDrive, but OneDrive can't open a zip. Unpack the parts in place, size the storage, or use the manual fallback.

Introduction

Google Takeout has an Add to OneDrive option, so a Google Photos export can go straight from Google to Microsoft without touching your computer. What arrives, though, is a stack of zip files — 2 GB each by default — and OneDrive can't do anything with them: open one in the browser and you get Can't preview this file and a Download button. Microsoft's own advice for Takeout zips is to sync them to a PC and extract them there.

This guide covers the whole OneDrive path: how the export gets in (and why some Google accounts don't offer OneDrive at all), what OneDrive does with the zips, how much storage the move really takes on a 2026 Microsoft 365 plan, and two ways to turn the parts into photo folders — server-side with CloudsLinker's Google Takeout import, or by downloading, extracting and using Folder upload.

The Short Answer
Getting the Export Into OneDrive
What OneDrive Does With a Takeout Zip
Plan the Space: Zips, Photos and Album Copies
Choose a Route
Method 1: Unpack the Export in the Cloud With CloudsLinker
Method 2: Download, Extract, Folder Upload
In OneDrive Afterwards
Video walkthrough
Frequently Asked Questions

The Short Answer

Takeout can write a Google Photos export into OneDrive, but only as zip files, and OneDrive can't extract a zip on the web. Turn the zips into folders either by letting CloudsLinker read them in place and copy the photos into Pictures, or by downloading and extracting them on a computer and uploading the result.

If Takeout doesn't offer Add to OneDrive for your account, export to Google Drive and copy from there — the photos end up in OneDrive just the same.

Getting the Export Into OneDrive

At takeout.google.com, select Google Photos only and go to Choose file type, frequency & destination. In Transfer to, choose Add to OneDrive. Takeout says it will upload the files to OneDrive and email you a link to their location; the button at the bottom becomes Link accounts and create export, which opens Microsoft's permission prompt.

Google Takeout step 2 with Transfer to set to Add to OneDrive, Google's notice that the files will be uploaded to OneDrive and a link emailed, and the frequency options below

Three details matter before you start:

Each OneDrive export needs a fresh approval. Google's help notes that for future exports to OneDrive you'll need to give Google access again (Google help).
The parts land in an Apps folder. Takeout writes into Apps › Google Download Your Data; the email's View in OneDrive button opens it. The photos are not mixed into Pictures.
Not every account offers OneDrive. On the Google Workspace account we used for testing, Transfer to listed Send download link via email, Add to Drive, Add to Dropbox and Add to Box — no OneDrive. Choose Add to Drive then, and copy from Drive to OneDrive in Method 1.

Keep the file type at .zip (the other choice is .tgz) and the part size at 2 GB or 10 GB; the menu offers 1, 2, 4, 10 and 50 GB.

What OneDrive Does With a Takeout Zip

We put a real Takeout part — the one holding the photos of a small test export — into OneDrive and opened it in the browser. OneDrive showed Can't preview this file. Open the file or download it to view in your desktop app. and a Download button. There is no list of the files inside and no extract command, in the viewer or in the folder toolbar.

OneDrive on the web opening takeout-20261028T074012Z-1-001.zip: Can't preview this file. Open the file or download it to view in your desktop app, with a Download button

Microsoft's own community answer to people holding Takeout zips in OneDrive is the same: sync them to a PC and extract them there (Microsoft Q&A). Dropbox at least extracts zips up to 512 MB in the browser — see Google Takeout to Dropbox — but OneDrive doesn't extract any size, and the OneDrive Photos view doesn't look inside zips either.

Plan the Space: Zips, Photos and Album Copies

The zips count against your OneDrive storage, and so do the photos you extract from them. Until the zips are deleted you need room for both. On top of that, Takeout stores every album photo twice — once in its Photos from YYYY folder and again in the album folder — so copying everything adds the album photos a second time.

OneDrive storage (2026)	Room for
Free, 5 GB	A test export only
Microsoft 365 Basic, 100 GB ($1.99/month)	About 50 GB of photos, if the zips and the extracted copy share the space
Microsoft 365 Personal, 1 TB	About 500 GB of photos delivered as zips, more if the export goes to Google Drive instead
Microsoft 365 Family, 2 TB shared by up to six people (plans bought from 8 October 2026)	Depends on what the others use; extra storage can be added up to 10 TB per subscription

Existing Family subscriptions move to the shared 2 TB pool at their first renewal on or after 2 May 2027 (Microsoft). A single file can be up to 250 GB in OneDrive (limits), so even 50 GB Takeout parts fit, but smaller parts are easier to handle on both routes.

Choose a Route

Your situation	Route
Export already in OneDrive, any size	Method 1, with OneDrive as both the export and the target
No Add to OneDrive option, or OneDrive too small for zips plus photos	Export to Google Drive, then Method 1 from Drive to OneDrive
A few gigabytes, a fast connection and free disk space	Method 2, download, extract and Folder upload

Method 1: Unpack the Export in the Cloud With CloudsLinker

CloudsLinker adds the zips as a read-only Google Takeout: it reads each part's table of contents, merges all parts into one folder tree, and copies photos straight out of the zips into OneDrive, checking each against the CRC-32 checksum stored in the archive.

Step 1: Export Google Photos to OneDrive (or Drive)

Create the export as described in Getting the Export Into OneDrive: Google Photos only, .zip, 2 GB or 10 GB parts, Add to OneDrive — or Add to Drive if OneDrive isn't offered. Wait for Google's email saying the export is complete. Then connect OneDrive in CloudsLinker with Add Cloud → OneDrive; it signs in on Microsoft's page at login.microsoftonline.com. Connect Google Drive too if the export went there.

Step 2: Add the Export as a Google Takeout

Open Add Cloud, search for takeout and choose Google Takeout. Set Cloud with your export to OneDrive, expand Apps and tick Google Download Your Data — a ticked folder includes every .zip inside it. (For an export in Drive, pick Google Drive and tick its Takeout folder.) Click Check archives, review the folders and file count, name the Takeout and click Add Takeout.

CloudsLinker Add Google Takeout dialog with Cloud with your export set to OneDrive and the folder Apps / Google Download Your Data ticked with its takeout zip parts, above the Check archives button

CloudsLinker Add Google Takeout review step listing year and album folders with file counts and sizes, a note that the archives are fixed once added and can only be copied from, and the Name field

Step 3: Copy the Folders Into OneDrive Pictures

Open Transfer. In Source, expand the Takeout and tick the Photos from YYYY folders for one copy of every photo; add album folders only if you want them as separate folders as well. In Target, expand OneDrive, open Pictures and create a folder such as Google Photos. Copy is selected and Move is unavailable because a Takeout is read-only. Click Create transfer.

CloudsLinker Create transfer task page: the Google Takeout source with Photos from 2021 to Photos from 2025 ticked and the album folders unticked, the new folder Pictures / Google Photos selected in OneDrive as the target, Copy checked and Move greyed out

Step 4: Follow the Task, Then Clean Up

The copy runs on CloudsLinker's servers, so the browser can be closed. Task monitor shows files and bytes done and the current speed; running the task again after an interruption skips files already in OneDrive with the same size. Transfer volume is the unpacked size of what you copy.

CloudsLinker Task monitor with a running copy from the Google Takeout year folders to OneDrive Pictures / Google Photos at 38 percent, with files and gigabytes done and the speed

When the folders are complete, delete the zips from Apps › Google Download Your Data and remove the Google Takeout from CloudsLinker; it can't read zips that are gone.

Method 2: Download, Extract, Folder Upload

Without a third-party service, the zips have to make a round trip through your computer. Free disk space for the zips and the photos at the same time.

Download every part. In OneDrive, open Apps › Google Download Your Data and download each zip (the Download button in the screenshot above). If you haven't exported yet, Send download link via email skips the OneDrive detour; those links expire in about 7 days and each archive can be downloaded 5 times.
Extract all parts into one folder so album folders split across zips merge. On Windows, 7-Zip copes better than the built-in extractor with parts over 4 GB.
Upload the result. In OneDrive, open Pictures, choose Create or upload → Folder upload and select the extracted Google Photos folder. For very large libraries, moving the folder into the OneDrive folder on a PC with the OneDrive app is more robust than a browser upload.
Delete the zips from OneDrive and from your disk.

OneDrive on the web in My files / Pictures with the Create or upload menu open and Folder upload highlighted, next to the Create album from folder button in the toolbar

In OneDrive Afterwards

Albums are folders. Open an album folder and click Create album from folder to get an OneDrive album with the same photos.
Names OneDrive refuses. OneDrive doesn't allow " * : < > ? / \ | or leading and trailing spaces in names. If an album or file name in the export uses one of them, CloudsLinker substitutes a full-width look-alike (： for :) instead of failing the file.
JSON files. Each photo has a .supplemental-metadata.json with Google's capture time, description and location, and each album a metadata.json. They are plain files in OneDrive. Exclude the json extension with a file filter if you don't want them.
Dates. The capture date inside each photo is unchanged, so the Photos view sorts phone and camera pictures correctly. The files' modified date is the export date.
Access. Remove Google from the apps with access to your Microsoft account (account.live.com/consent/Manage), and delete the Google Takeout in CloudsLinker.

Watch: Unzip a Google Takeout Into OneDrive Without Downloading

A narrated walkthrough of the CloudsLinker route with the export in Google Drive: adding the Takeout zips as a Google Takeout (Check archives, then Add Takeout), connecting OneDrive on Microsoft's own sign-in page and copying the Photos from year folders to OneDrive on CloudsLinker's servers. The steps are the same when the zips are already in OneDrive.

Frequently Asked Questions

No. OneDrive on the web has no extract command; opening a Takeout zip shows Can't preview this file with a Download button. Microsoft's answer to users with Takeout zips in OneDrive is to sync them to a PC and extract them there. To unpack them without a computer, a service has to read the zips remotely — CloudsLinker adds them as a read-only Google Takeout and copies the folders inside to OneDrive.

Not every Google account gets it. On the Google Workspace account we tested, Transfer to listed Send download link via email, Add to Drive, Add to Dropbox and Add to Box, but not OneDrive. In that case choose Add to Drive, then add the zips in Google Drive as a Google Takeout in CloudsLinker and pick OneDrive as the target — the result in OneDrive is the same.

Yes. Google's help says that if you export to OneDrive in the future you'll need to give Google access again, so each Add to OneDrive export goes through Microsoft's permission prompt. Google can then write the export into a folder it creates under Apps in your OneDrive.

While you work, room for the zips and the extracted photos together — about twice the export — plus album duplicates if you copy album folders. Microsoft 365 Basic has 100 GB, Personal 1 TB, and Family plans bought from 8 October 2026 share a 2 TB pool among up to six people; the free tier is 5 GB. If OneDrive is tight, deliver the export to Google Drive instead so only the photos land in OneDrive.

OneDrive refuses the characters " * : < > ? / \ | and leading or trailing spaces in names. If a folder or file name in the export contains one of them, CloudsLinker writes a full-width look-alike instead — ： in place of : — so it is created and still reads the same. Windows has the same rule, so such names need renaming when you extract on a PC.

As folders, not albums. Each album arrives as a folder of its photos. Open the folder in OneDrive and click Create album from folder to turn it into an OneDrive album. Photos in the year folders appear in the Photos view by their own dates, because the capture date inside each file (EXIF) is unchanged.

The photos and videos are the original files; a photo we extracted from a Takeout zip was byte-identical to the one uploaded to Google Photos. What doesn't carry over by itself is Google's metadata in the .supplemental-metadata.json files — capture time for images without EXIF, descriptions, locations added in Google Photos. Those files are copied as plain files; nothing applies them to the photos.

For Google: in your Microsoft account open the list of apps you've given access to (account.live.com/consent/Manage) and remove the Google entry. For CloudsLinker: delete the Google Takeout and, if you no longer need it, the OneDrive connection.

Conclusion

OneDrive can store a Takeout but not open it, so the zips need a reader. CloudsLinker reads them where Takeout put them and copies the year or album folders into OneDrive's Pictures, without a download and without your PC's disk. The manual route — download, extract all parts into one folder, Folder upload — works for exports your computer and connection can carry. Size the OneDrive plan for the zips and the photos at the same time, delete the zips when the folders are complete, and remove Google's access to OneDrive afterwards. If your Google account doesn't offer Add to OneDrive, send the export to Google Drive and copy across from there.

Related: unzip Google Takeout in the cloud, Google Photos to OneDrive, Google Takeout to Dropbox and OneDrive connection notes.

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