iPhones have an amazing camera app for getting the astounding photos like a pro. You snap and store thousands of photos, capture every special moment of your lives with your iPhone camera.
But, what if one day you realize your valuable pictures are missing from the iPhone!
You may go crazy. How could this happen? Was it an iOS update to 12.1.1, an accidental deletion in hurry, or your Camera Roll just crashed for unknown reason!
Possible reasons for the loss of photos from iPhone
- Accidently deleted photos
- Camera Roll or Photo Stream crashed
- Set iPhone to factory settings
- Failed iOS update
- iPhone jailbreak and others
Whatsoever the reason, you want your photos back on your iPhone now.
Don’t worry. Here we share the best 4 methods to safely recover lost or deleted photos from iPhone.
Methods to recover photos from iPhone
- Recover photos from Recently Deleted folder
- Recover from iCloud backup
- Recover from iTunes Backup
- Restore photos with iPhone recovery software
These methods can be applied on all iPhone models including iPhone X, 8 Plus, 8, 7 Plus, 7, 6S Plus, 6S, 6 Plus, 6, 5S, 5c, 5, 4S and 4.
1. Recover photos from ‘Recently Deleted’ folder
Deleted photos stay in the ‘Recently Deleted’ folder on iPhone for 30 days. You can check the ‘Recently Deleted’ folder for the missing photos and move them back to your album.
To recover photos from ‘Recently Deleted’ folder on iPhone:
- Open the Photos app. Go to Albums
- Open Recently Deleted and click Select
- Select the required photos
- Tap Recover
2. Recover from iCloud backup
If you have enabled iCloud backup on iPhone, the deleted or lost photos will still be present in the iCloud backup. Recover them from iCloud.
To restore photos from iCloud on your iPhone:
- Follow Settings > General > Reset> Erase all Contents and Settings
- On Apps & Data screen, click Restore from iCloud Backup
- Sign in to your iCloud account
- Choose the recent backup and click Restore
3. Recover from iTunes backup
Do you have iTunes backup? Then recover lost or deleted photos from iTunes.
To restore photos from iTunes backup:
- Connect iPhone to your computer
- Launch iTunes and sign in
- Select your iPhone under the Device list
- Choose the recent backup entry date
- Click Restore Backup
All your lost and deleted photos are restored on your iPhone. However, you end up losing the existing data on your device.
4. Use an iPhone photo recovery software
If you can’t find your photos in iCloud and iTunes backup, or any error prevents the recovery, use an iPhone photo recovery software such as Stellar Data Recovery for iPhone. The DIY software is recommended because, unlike iTunes and iCloud, it protects the existing data, passwords, and other settings on your iPhone and restores only the lost photos.
The added advantage is that you can also recover missing or accidentally deleted videos, contacts, messages, calendar, call history, WhatsApp chat, voice memos, etc., directly from iPhone and iPad.
Stellar Data Recovery for iPhone works with all the latest iPhones and includes support for iOS 12.1.1.
Benefits of Stellar Data Recovery for iPhone
- Allows you select and restore only the required deleted and lost photos.
- Doesn’t delete or replace the existing iPhone data
- Recovers lost photos from iPhone, iPad, iCloud and iTunes
- Works in various loss cases like factory reset, damaged iPhone, stolen iPhone, data loss after iOS update, and others
In Steps: How to recover lost iPhone photos
- Connect your iPhone to the PC or Mac
- Download Stellar Data Recovery for iPhone on your computer
- On the main screen select any one option:
- Recover from iPhone (select if deleted photos from iPhone, no backup)
- Recover from iCloud (select if can’t recover from iCloud backup)
- Recover from iTunes (select if can’t restore from iTunes backup)
- Check in Camera Roll and Photo Stream and click Next
- The list of found photos appears. Preview and select the photos you want to restore
- Click Save
- A dialog box appears and gives option to save the recovered photos in – computer or iPhone. Choose the desired location and click OK.
Wrapping Up
Photo loss due to accidental deletion, Camera Roll crash, Photo Stream failure and other iOS issues is common with iPhone users.
Apple’s backup solutions – iCloud and iTunes come as rescue in such situation.
However, the drawback of these solutions is that they erase all the existing data on your iPhone and replace it with the new one. Thus, you might end up losing other important files.
An iPhone recovery software like Stellar Data Recovery for iPhone is always preferred for the specific recovery of lost photos. You can choose only those photos that you want to restore on your iPhone and bypass all the unnecessary data.