Trove vs Cluster: Shared Group Albums or a Family Edition?
Short answer
Trove sends your family one curated edition a week — the best photos, laid out, with a short written summary — to anyone with an inbox, free with no cap on photos or recipients, and the same month can be printed and posted for $4.99 a month. Cluster also reaches the inbox, which most comparisons miss: every post is emailed to the whole group with the photo inline, and members can like and comment straight from the email. What it does not do is compose. You get one alert per photo, in upload order, with nothing chosen and no rhythm — which is exactly right for a wedding or a two-week holiday where ten people are all posting, and wrong for an ongoing relationship with grandparents, where a stream of single-photo emails is the thing people quietly stop opening. Cluster is free for 10 groups of 1,000 photos, sells photo books from $10, and its paid tiers from $4.99 a month raise the caps. Cluster is for the event. Trove is for the years.
Cluster is one of the longer-running products in this space — on the App Store since 2013 — and it is deliberately broader than family: private group albums for a trip, a team, a wedding or a family, with multiple contributors as a first-class idea rather than an afterthought.
At a glance
| Trove | Cluster | |
|---|---|---|
| What arrives, and how often | One curated edition, emailed every Sunday | An email per post, as it happens, photo inline |
| What the recipient needs | An email address | Follows by email without the app; an account to open the album |
| Laid out, with a written summary | ||
| Free plan | Everything, free — unlimited photos, children and recipients | 10 groups, 1,000 photos each, 50 members, 1-min SD video |
| Printed edition posted | Paper Edition, posted monthly, $4.99/mo | |
| Built for | Families | Any private group |
| Paid plan | No paid app plan; print from $4.99/mo | Friend $4.99/mo, Family $9.99/mo, Pro $19.99/mo |
| Multiple contributors | Family members can contribute | Core feature |
| Curation | AI picks the best of the week | Everything posted, in upload order |
| Photo books | Hardcover from $25, softcover from $10 | |
| Milestones | First steps, words, tooth, birthdays, custom | |
| Automatic face grouping | ||
| Search by child and date | ||
| Video | Yes, 3 minutes per clip | 1 minute SD free; up to 10 minutes HD paid |
| Reactions and comments | Like and comment, including from the email | |
| 'This time last year' flashbacks |
Where Cluster is genuinely better
Group contribution. If you want ten people all adding photos to one album — a family reunion, a shared holiday, a wedding — Cluster is built around that, and it handles it more naturally than apps designed around one parent posting.
It reaches people who will not install anything. Cluster's email notifications are a real feature, not a fallback: the photo is in the email, and a relative can like it and comment on it without opening the app. Its wedding page goes further and says guests need no account at all, though its help centre still says an account is required to open or post to an album. Either way, the inbox works.
It is not family-specific. Sometimes the group you want is not a family, and most apps in this category cannot help you at all.
Printed books, and no ads ever. Cluster prints hardcovers from $25 and softcovers from $10 out of any album, with free shipping up to $10 for subscribers, and it has never carried advertising.
What each one actually sends
Cluster emails every post to the group the moment it happens — a stream of single-photo alerts rather than one curated edition. For a two-week holiday that is exactly right: the alerts are the point, and then the trip ends. For grandparents it becomes noise, and noise is what people learn to stop opening.
Trove composes instead. Photos go in during the week, and every Sunday one edition goes out — the best of the week, laid out properly, with a short written summary of what happened — to everyone on your list, with no app and no account for recipients and no cap on how many there are. It is narrower than Cluster on purpose: one thing, for families, arriving on a rhythm.
The other difference is what happens at the edges of the free plan. Cluster's is generous but counted: 10 groups, 1,000 photos in each, 50 members, and one-minute standard-definition video. Paid tiers — Friend $4.99 a month, Family $9.99, Pro $19.99 — raise the caps, lengthen video to ten HD minutes and add web upload and permission controls. Trove's free plan has no cap on photos, children, contributors or recipients; video is fair use rather than a tier.
The app is free. The one paid thing is print: the Paper Edition posts a printed edition of the month — cover photo and up to five more, captions and a short summary — for $4.99 a month including one mailing address, $4 a month for each extra address. US only for now. Photo books are the other printed option, from $29.99 as a one-off.
The short version
- Pick Trove ifyou want one composed edition a week rather than an alert per photo, you want milestones and face grouping, or you want a printed edition posted to a relative with no screen.
- Pick Cluster ifyou want a shared album many people contribute to, family or otherwise, and per-post emails are what you actually want.
- Use both ifCluster for one-off group events, Trove for the ongoing family update.
Does Cluster email photos to the group?+
Yes — it is one of Cluster's marketed use cases. When someone posts, everyone in the group gets an email with the photo in it, and can like and comment from the email. There are push notifications too. What Cluster does not send is a curated edition: you get one email per post, in the order they were uploaded. Trove sends one email a week with the week chosen, laid out and summarised.
Is Cluster free?+
Cluster is free for up to 10 groups of 1,000 photos each, 50 members per group, and one-minute standard-definition video, with no upload from the web. Paid plans — Friend $4.99/month or $49.99/year, Family $9.99/month or $99.99/year, Pro $19.99/month or $199.99/year — raise those caps, allow up to ten-minute HD video and add admin controls. Cluster's help pages say members need an account to open the album, though every post is also emailed to them.
Does Cluster print photo books?+
Yes, from any group album: hardcover from $25 (20–100 pages, 8" or 12" square, lay-flat) and softcover from $10 (50–180 pages, 5½" square), delivered in 7–14 days, with free shipping up to $10 an order for subscribers.
Is Cluster good for family photo sharing?+
It works well when several relatives are all contributing to one album, such as a reunion or a shared holiday, and its per-post emails mean a grandparent can follow along without the app. It is less suited to keeping distant grandparents in the loop week to week, because what they get is one alert per photo rather than something composed to sit down and read.
Can several people add photos in Trove?+
Yes. Family members can contribute to your Trove, and the weekly edition draws from everything added. The difference is that the edition then goes out to your whole recipient list automatically, including people who are not contributors and have no account.
Built for the ongoing family update
Trove emails one curated edition of the week to your whole family every Sunday. No app for them, unlimited recipients, free forever.
Try Trove — FreePricing and features were checked on September 21, 2026. Competitors change their plans — if you spot something out of date, tell us and we will correct it.
