Photo Storage

I'm just curious what everyone is doing to store and manage their photos these days. 99% of the photos we take (mostly of the kids) are on my and the wife's iPhone. Historically, I download all the photos at the end of the year and save on a hard drive (which is painful) and have both devices set up on Google Photos, which is where I view them primarily.

I have given up on organizing the hard drive into folders and now just use "2020 CidCock iphone" and drop everything in there and again use Google Photo to view them. It's not the best solution, but I maintain a hard copy and a digital copy.

With Google photo starting to charge this year, it doesn't seem like it's the best option. If I am going to pay, I'd rather not pay Google. Google's search is incredible and I hate to give it up moving forward, but I am definitely not planning on paying an escalating cost (as more storage is required moving forward). What's the future of this look like?

I still have hard copies of everything and believe most of the metadata has been preserved, so I'm hoping I don't have to go back to sorting photos through File Explorer.

Not sure what my questions is, other than what is everyone else doing?