Deleted the wrong folder, emptied the recycle bin, or formatted the wrong drive? It happens to everyone. The good news is that deleted files are often recoverable – but only if you stop and act carefully. This guide explains what actually happens when you delete or format, and what to do to keep your chances high.
What happens when you delete a file
On a hard drive, deleting a file usually just marks its space as free. The data stays in place until something new is written over it. A quick format works in a similar way: it creates a new, empty file system but leaves most of the old data on the disk. That is why the most important rule is to stop writing to the drive.
SSDs are different. Most modern SSDs use a feature called TRIM, which tells the drive which blocks are no longer needed so it can clear them in the background. On an internal SSD, deleted files can become unrecoverable quickly – sometimes within minutes. Memory cards and many USB sticks don’t use TRIM, so they behave more like hard drives.
Do this straight away
- Stop using the drive. Don’t save files, install programs, or download anything to it.
- If it is the drive your computer runs from, shut the computer down. Even sitting idle, the operating system writes logs, updates and temporary files.
- For a camera card or USB stick, remove it and don’t take more photos or copy files onto it.
- Check the obvious places first: the Recycle Bin or Bin, cloud version history, and any backup (File History, Time Machine).
Things not to do
- Don’t install recovery software onto the same drive you are trying to recover from – the installation itself can overwrite the files.
- Don’t save recovered files back to the same drive. Always recover to a different disk.
- Don’t run CHKDSK, “repair” tools or reinstall the operating system if you have formatted or partitioned the wrong disk.
- Don’t keep using a drive that also has physical symptoms – clicking, slowness or freezing. That is no longer a simple deletion.
When to get professional help
If the files matter and the first simple checks haven’t found them, it is safer to have the drive imaged before trying anything else. In the lab we take a complete sector-by-sector copy and work on that, searching for remnants of the old file system and for file signatures in free space. That is also the safest approach for accidentally re-partitioned drives, overwritten system restores and formatted camera cards.
See our deleted file recovery, photo recovery and Windows data recovery pages, or call 020 7394 2525 for free advice before you do anything else.