Coldkeep vs Google Photos Locked Folder.
Locked Folder is the quick option if you already use Google Photos. Coldkeep is for people who want a separate unlock and a recovery phrase they hold themselves.
Last reviewed 27 October 2026
If you just want a few photos out of your main grid and you already use Google Photos, use Locked Folder. It is part of the app and opens with the screen lock you already have. For many people that is enough.
Coldkeep is for the cases where it isn’t. It is an Android app for hiding photos and videos, on Google Play. There’s no account. Pick it if you don’t want your phone’s screen lock to be the only thing between someone and your photos.
What Locked Folder does well
Locked Folder is easy, and Google’s help page is clear about how it works.
- It is part of the Photos app. Google describes it as a folder protected by your device screen lock, inside Google Photos. There is nothing extra to install or remember.
- It keeps items away from other apps. Google says locked items don’t appear in the Photos grid, memories, search or albums. They aren’t available to other apps on your device that have access to your photos and videos.
- Backup is optional, and you pick how. You can turn on automatic backup for Locked Folder, or leave it off and back up single items by hand.
- Backed-up items follow your Google Account. With backup on, Google says you can reach your Locked Folder from other devices when you’re signed in.
- It has a plain encryption statement. Google says Locked Folder is protected by Google Photos’ standard encryption practices.
It also has limits Google spells out. Locked items can’t be shared, added to albums or edited, and you have to move them out first. Moving an item doesn’t move its copies or edited versions. Locked Folder needs Android 6 or later.
Google’s page doesn’t describe the encryption method or who holds the keys for backed-up items. We don’t claim anything about that either way.
Side by side
| Google Photos Locked Folder | Coldkeep | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | A folder inside the Google Photos app | An Android app for hiding photos and videos |
| How you get it | Built into Google Photos | Separate app |
| What unlocks it | Your phone’s screen lock. Google says the Locked Folder password is the same as your device screen lock, and people who have access to the screen lock can unlock it | Your pattern or passphrase, stretched with Argon2id before it’s used. |
| Account | A Google Account is needed to reach backed-up items from other devices | No account. Coldkeep has no internet permission. Android itself blocks it from going online. |
| If you forget the lock | Google’s page doesn’t cover this. The password is your screen lock | A 12-word recovery phrase you write down. It opens your vault if you forget your pattern. |
| New phone | With backup on, sign in to your Google Account on the other device. With backup off, items aren’t transferred in USB-to-USB device transfers or cloud data transfers | Excluded from Android backup and phone-to-phone transfer. With your backup file, your recovery phrase brings everything in it back on a new phone. Without a backup file, a new phone starts empty. |
| Backups | Automatic, if you turn it on, or by hand per item. Backed-up items count toward your Google storage | Encrypted backup in one file you can keep anywhere: Drive, a USB stick, a computer. It opens with your pattern or passphrase, or your 12-word recovery phrase. You make each backup yourself; there’s no automatic backup. See the limits |
| If the phone is lost or reset | Items you haven’t backed up can be lost: if the device is damaged or lost, or if you factory reset, clear Photos app data or uninstall Photos | Only what’s in your latest backup file comes back. With your backup file, your recovery phrase brings everything in it back on a new phone. Backups aren’t automatic. Without a backup file, nothing can be recovered. |
Where Coldkeep is different
A separate unlock. With Locked Folder, anyone who can unlock your phone can open it. Your pattern or passphrase is stretched with Argon2id before it’s used. Wrong guesses are slowed down.
Protection for files on the phone. Files are encrypted with AES-256-GCM using Google’s Tink library, each with its own key. On phones with secure hardware, unlocking also needs a key held in that hardware, so vault files copied off the phone can’t be cracked on another computer. That applies to vault files on the phone. It doesn’t apply to backup files.
Recovery and backup you hold. A 12-word recovery phrase you write down. It opens your vault if you forget your pattern, and with your backup file it brings everything back on a new phone. The phrase alone doesn’t bring photos back onto a new phone. That needs the backup file too.
Encrypted backup in one file you can keep anywhere: Drive, a USB stick, a computer. It opens with your pattern or passphrase, or your 12-word recovery phrase. A backup file has limits of its own. Read what a backup file can’t do.
Hidden vaults (Coldkeep Pro). Hidden vaults: a second pattern opens a separate vault, and Coldkeep never shows a list of vaults. Give a hidden vault a long pattern or a passphrase. That, not the wrong-guess delays, is what keeps it out of reach of someone who knows another of your patterns.
What Coldkeep doesn’t do. It isn’t a gallery. If you want your locked photos to stay inside the Photos app, Locked Folder fits better.
What Coldkeep doesn’t protect against
Locked Folder has limits, and Google’s page lists some of them. Here are Coldkeep’s, in plain terms.
- A compromised phone while the vault is open. Malware with root, accessibility or screen access can see what you see.
- Someone watching you draw your pattern. Hiding the trail helps. A passphrase helps more.
- Being forced to unlock. If someone makes you open Coldkeep, they see what is in it. Hidden vaults help inside the app, but forensic analysis can tell how many vaults exist. Someone who knows one of your patterns isn’t slowed down by the wrong-guess delays when trying others on your phone, because opening the vault they know resets the delays. A long pattern or a passphrase for a hidden vault is what keeps it out of reach.
- Copies elsewhere. Deleting an original removes it from your gallery. It doesn’t delete copies in Google Photos’ cloud backup, chat apps or other backups. Flash storage may also keep deleted blocks for a while. Android’s own encryption protects those blocks, not us. If your photo was already backed up by Google Photos, that copy stays there.
- Losing both the phone (or your credential) and your recovery phrase. Then nobody can get your files back, including us. That is the price of real encryption.
- Memory forensics. Clearing keys from memory is best effort.
- Video recording. Videos from the Coldkeep camera sit in Coldkeep’s private storage while recording and are encrypted the moment you stop.
- Knowing you use Coldkeep. The app shows in your app list and your Play account’s library. Coldkeep doesn’t disguise itself.
- A short pattern on a backup file. Someone who gets your backup file can try patterns on their own computer, without Coldkeep’s delays and without your phone’s secure hardware. A short or common pattern can be guessed in hours. A long pattern (8+ dots, not a letter or shape) or a passphrase makes it impractical, and your 12 words can’t be guessed at all. See the full limits page.
Questions
Is Google Photos Locked Folder encrypted?
Google says Locked Folder is protected by Google Photos’ standard encryption practices. Its help page doesn’t describe the method or key handling, so we can’t say more.
Can someone open Locked Folder if they know my phone’s PIN?
Google says the Locked Folder password is the same as your device screen lock, and that people who have access to the screen lock can unlock it. Anyone who can unlock your phone can also open it.
What happens to Locked Folder if I factory reset or lose my phone?
If backup is off, Google says items are deleted on a factory reset, when you clear app data or when you delete the Photos app. You’ll also lose items you haven’t backed up if the device is damaged or lost. With backup on, you can reach them from other devices signed in to your Google Account. See our Locked Folder guide for the steps.
Is Locked Folder a good place for photos I don’t want anyone to see?
For casual privacy, yes. It keeps photos out of your grid and out of other apps. If the main worry is someone who knows your screen lock, it is weaker on that point, as Google’s own description shows.
Does Coldkeep replace Google Photos?
No. Coldkeep is a vault for photos and videos you want locked away. Google Photos is a gallery and backup service. They do different jobs.
Sources
Checked against these official pages on 27 October 2026.