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Hello,
Yesterday either I or my iPhone threw a fit and deleted some photos for good, and now I want them back. How to recover deleted photos from iPhone? I’ll appreciate your guidance!

We’re here to help you on your quest. Luckily, there are many ways to recover deleted photos from iPhone, you just need to know where to go.

However, while recovering your deleted photos, you can get more and more questions:

– Can I recover permanently deleted photos from my iPhone?
– How can I recover permanently deleted photos from my iPhone without backup?
– Are permanently deleted photos gone forever from iPhone?

So, keep calm and follow our instructions on how to recover deleted photos:

The methods described in this article can be applied to all iPhone models, including iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Mini/Pro/Pro Max, iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 Mini/Pro/Pro Max, iPhone SE (3rd), 12/12 Pro Max, 11 Pro/Max, 11, XS, XS Max, XR, X, 8 Plus, 8, 7 Plus, 7, 6S Plus, 6S, 6 Plus, 6, 5S, 5c, 5, 4S, and 4.


How to find deleted photos on iPhone

By default, pictures taken with the Camera app are saved to Photos. The Recently Deleted folder in the Photos app is the first place where you can find deleted photos on iPhone.

  1. Go to Photos -> Albums -> Scroll down to find the Recently Deleted section.

  2. Restore photos from Recently Deleted

  3. Click on Select in the top-right corner -> choose the images to restore -> press Recover.

  4. Recover deleted photos on iPhone

    Your recently deleted photos will be safely returned to Camera Roll.

If you didn’t find the photos you need in the Recently Deleted folder on your iPhone, we still have a great solution for you! With the “iCloud Photos” function enabled, you have a chance to recover deleted photos from the Apple servers with CopyTrans Cloudly. Follow the steps below and get deleted photos back!

ATTENTION: if you enable the function “iCloud Photos” in iPhone settings, then the photos will be stored in iCloud directly, but will NOT be included in the iCloud backup. Please find more information about iCloud backup here.

If the iCloud Photos option is on, you can find your deleted photos in iCloud with CopyTrans Cloudly.

If you’ve saved your photos in iCloud backup (iCloud Photos off, iCloud backup on), you’d need to extract your deleted photos from a previous iCloud backup.


How to retrieve deleted photos on iPhone

Restore deleted iPhone photos without backup

If you don’t have photos in iCloud backup, then try to find them in the “Recently Deleted” folder in iCloud. Go to iCloud.com and sign in to your iCloud. In Photos select the Recently Deleted folder. And then click on “Recover”.

Recently deleted folder in iCloud

Unfortunately, this method has some disadvantages:

❌ It’s possible to recover not more than 1000 photos at once
❌ The photos can be already deleted from the “Recently deleted” folder

But we have a great solution for you! If your photos were not in the backup, they were maybe synced to iCloud before you deleted them. If so, it is time for desperate measures: CopyTrans Cloudly. The software has a chance to retrieve deleted photos if they were removed from iCloud.

CopyTrans Cloudly will:

go to iCloud servers;
search for all your photos Apple hasn’t deleted yet;
recover deleted photos to your computer.

You can then transfer your recovered photos back to your iPhone!

We’ll show you the way to recover permanently deleted photos iPhone:

  1. Download and install CopyTrans Cloudly.

    Get CopyTrans Cloudly

  2. Run CopyTrans Cloudly. Sign in with your Apple ID. We use an SSL connection to protect your data, so you’re safe!

    Recover deleted photos from iCloud

  3. To recover deleted photos from iCloud, click on “Rescue” and choose the folder you want to save them to.
    Recover deleted photos to iPhone

  4. If your deleted photos and videos are still on the Apple servers, CopyTrans Cloudly will download them back to your PC.

    Recover permanently deleted photos iphone

  5. A-and done! The photos are waiting for you in the destination folder. You can now transfer photos back to iPhone.

    Photos recovered with CopyTrans Cloudly

  6. CopyTrans Cloudly will show you the number of photos available and download the first 100 photos at once: you will be able to see if they are the ones you need. We recommend that you rescue all the photos on the same day, as Apple may swiftly delete the photos after we access them.

    Once you’ve decided to restore, please make haste!

    💡 TIP: CopyTrans Cloudly can also help you:

    download everything from the iCloud library to your PC in one go
    upload photos to iCloud
    delete all photos from iCloud in one click to free up your storage.

    Download CopyTrans Cloudly


Restore deleted photos from iCloud backup

You can restore deleted photos from iCloud backup only if the photos and videos were backed up, but if you have the “iCloud Photos” function enabled, then the photos will be stored directly in iCloud. In this case, try CopyTrans Cloudly as a perfect way to restore permanently deleted photos.

If you’d like to restore your photos from iCloud backup to your PC – use CopyTrans Backup Extractor.

  1. First, make sure that you have a valid iCloud backup that contains deleted photos. On your iPhone, go to Settings -> Apple ID -> iCloud -> Storage -> Manage Storage -> Backups. You should be able to see the device, date, and size of the last backup.

    Open the most recent iCloud backup

  2. If you have the backup you want to restore, go ahead and reset your device. Yes, you’ll need to erase all content, but we will get everything back! Go to Settings -> General -> Reset -> Erase All Content and Settings.

    Erase all content and settings on the iPhone

  3. Restart your device. Go to Apps and Data, select “Restore from iCloud backup” and log in to your iCloud account.

    How to restore deleted pictures using iCloud

  4. Select the backup that contains your deleted iPhone photos.Choose the backup that contains the deletes photos from iPhone

Disadvantages of this method:

❌ All the data and settings on your iPhone will be erased and replaced with data from the backup;

❌ You can only restore photos to iPhone, not to PC.

❌ It may take a lot of time to restore the whole iCloud backup.

✅ Check out a better solution – CopyTrans Backup Extractor and recover deleted photos in a few clicks.


Recover deleted photos iPhone

from an iTunes or iCloud backup

If your photos are not in Recently Deleted, they may be in one of your backups – in iTunes or iCloud.

What is a backup? Do I have any?? There is no need to worry about it with CopyTrans Backup Extractor: it will deal with any backup for you and recover deleted photos.

With CopyTrans Backup Extractor, you can:

find all your iTunes and iCloud backups (automatically!)
extract your deleted photos to PC
extract other data types to PC

You can then transfer your recovered photos back to your iPhone.

Let’s go through retrieving deleted photos step by step:

  1. Download and install CopyTrans Backup Extractor.

    Get CopyTrans Backup Extractor

  2. Start the program and click on Find Backups.

    ☁️To see iCloud backups, click on “iCloud Backups” and log in to your iCloud account first.

    Find iPhone backups with CopyTrans Backup Extractor

  3. You will see a list of all available backups: choose the one that contains your photos. If you are restoring from iTunes backup, you may be asked for a backup password. What password?

    Enter the backup password in CopyTrans Backup Extractor

    iCloud backups are never password protected.

  4. Select Photos, then click Extract.

    How to retrieve deleted photos from iPhone backup with CopyTrans Backup Extractor

  5. Select the destination folder and confirm. Wait… CopyTrans Backup Extractor is wielding magic.

    iPhone photo recovery in progress

  6. Voila!

    Recover deleted photos iphone

    Now you can click on “Go to folder” to see all the photos migrated there. You can now transfer recovered photos back to iPhone.

Why is CopyTrans Backup Extractor exactly what you need?
Download Now
  • Extract photos from iPhone backup in HEIC, PNG, and JPEG formats
  • Extract videos from iPhone backup in MOV and MP4 formats
  • Extract contacts from iPhone backup in VCARD format (separate files)
  • Extract text messages from iPhone backup (SMS, iMessages, WhatsApp, LINE) in PDF (with attachments that are placed in a separate folder)
  • Extract notes from iPhone backup in HTML format
  • Extract calendars from iPhone backup in ICS format


How to retrieve deleted photos

YouTube guide

For those who love visual instructions, we prepared a video guide on how to get back deleted photos.

⚡ This method proves helpful in the following situations:

– iPhone can’t restore from a backup because it’s corrupt or incompatible;
– your iPhone is broken or lost;
– you want to recover deleted pictures on your iPhone without overwriting the old ones;
– iPhone photos disappeared;
– you want to transfer photos from an iPhone backup to an Android.


Recover deleted photos

Summary table

If your photos cannot be found in Recently Deleted, you need to up your game and consider using specialized software. We have two options for you here, CopyTrans Backup Extractor and CopyTrans Cloudly. See what they can do below:

iTunes CopyTrans Cloudly CopyTrans Backup Extractor iCloud
Requirements iPhone and cable PC and Wi-Fi PC and Wi-Fi iPhone and Wi-Fi
Recover data from iTunes backup
Recover data from iCloud backup
Leave other iPhone data intact
Recover photos without backup
Restore your photos to iPhone
*you can transfer them to your iPhone later

*you can transfer them to your iPhone later
Extract photos to PC

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How to get deleted photos back

Restore deleted photos to iPhone from iTunes Backup

If you managed to find a recent backup in iTunes, consider yourself lucky: it will restore deleted pictures to your iPhone.

However:

☹️ All the data and settings on your iPhone will be erased and replaced with data from the backup;
😐 You can only restore photos to iPhone, not to PC.

If you’d like to restore your photos to your PC – use CopyTrans Backup Extractor.
If you’d like to restore only photos to your iPhone – use CopyTrans Shelbee.

If you are OK with it, here is how to restore your photos using iTunes:

  1. Run iTunes and connect your device to your PC;
  2. Wait until your iPhone appears on iTunes’ top panel and click on the iPhone icon;
  3. Select your device in iTunes

  4. Click on “Summary” to open a summary screen; then click on “Restore Backup”;
  5. How to restore deleted photos using iTunes

  6. iTunes may ask you to turn off “Find my iPhone”.

    iTunes message Find My iPhone must be turned off

  7. Choose the backup you need and click on “Restore”.
  8. Recover deleted pictures on iPhone from iTunes backup

    If your backup is encrypted, enter your iOS backup password. What password?

  9. Now just wait until the process finishes.
  10. How to recover deleted photos from iPhone

  11. Here you go! Your photos are safe.

Hope one of these methods will help you recover deleted photos. Please make sure that you back up your device on a weekly/monthly basis to ensure the safety of your precious memories.

CopyTrans 7 Pack

If you want to manage an iOS device, CopyTrans offers you many options:

Export and import contacts with CopyTrans Contacts

Transfer photos between iPhone and PC with CopyTrans Photos

Find iPhone or iCloud backups with CopyTrans Backup Extractor

Manage iCloud Photos: download, delete, and recover photos with CopyTrans Cloudly

Back up and restore iPhone with CopyTrans Shelbee

Save your iPhone music on PC or iTunes with CopyTrans

Manage iTunes library with CopyTrans Swift

Download CopyTrans 7 Pack


Conclusion

Now you know how to recover deleted photos from iPhone! You should always start by checking the Recently Deleted album, which is where all deleted photos are kept for 30 days.

If you miss this critical window, your only option is to use specialized software – CopyTrans Backup Extractor. With CopyTrans Backup Extractor you don’t need any special skills or knowledge about computers – everything is very easy and intuitive!

Avatar for Marika CopyTrans
By Marika CopyTrans

Marika (pronounce like 'Merica) dreams of saving the world from boredom. Fairly believes that she was the one for the part of Wonder Woman in DC movies, but for now she is eager to make your CopyTrans journey remarkable.