Facebook starts rolling out Photo Sync for everyone

We told you a couple of weeks ago that Facebook had begun rolling out its new Photo Sync feature which, predictably, lets the Facebook app automatically upload your photos, ready for viewing on the Facebook website or inside any of the company’s apps. Turns out Facebook was rolling it out to a select few, testing the feature with plans to roll it out to everyone at a later date. That date is today.

Announcing the move on its blog, Facebook today said that its Photo Sync feature will be available to all, with all the magic already built right into the existing Facebook app for iOS. The social giant needs to activate your account on their end, and voila, you’ve got a new feature.

Pretty nifty indeed…

So, what will you get when your account gets switched on? Well, inside the Facebook app you’ll have access to the same Photos menu you’re no doubt already familiar with. The difference is now you’ll see a new Sync button. Tapping this will switch the whole thing on, and the magic happens as if by, well, magic. Simple.

Now worry not, for Facebook allows some basic settings to be fiddled with. You can tell the app to only upload on Wi-Fi connections, for example, and it will only start transferring images if it deems your battery life to be high enough. You can also, of course, just turn the whole shebang off should you so desire. Even if you do let the Facebook app do its syncing thing, your photos will be uploaded to an unpublished album, so, in theory at least, they’re nice and private. In theory!

With Google+ and Dropbox already offering almost identical features, Facebook was always going to get in on the action. Our Facebook accounts are yet to have their respective switches flicked at Facebook HQ, but we’ll give Photo Sync a shot as soon as they are.

Is your account live yet?

[TNW]