How To Recover Files (including Photos and Videos) on Mac

Losing files to a corrupted drive, an accidental delete, or a failing disk is one of those gut-punch moments every Mac user dreads. The good news: on a Mac you often have several ways to get your files back, and the right one depends on how they were lost. Here’s how to recover files on a Mac, in the order I’d actually try them.

Step 1: Check the Trash and Recently Deleted

The obvious first stop. Files you deleted normally sit in the Trash until you empty it, so open it and look. In the Photos app, deleted images go to a Recently Deleted album that holds them for 30 days, and in Files and iCloud Drive there’s a Recently Deleted folder too. A lot of “lost” files are simply sitting in one of these, one click from being restored.

Step 2: Restore from Time Machine

If you have Time Machine set up, this is the cleanest recovery there is. Connect your backup drive, open the folder where the file used to live, launch Time Machine, and step back through time to a point before the file was lost. Select it and hit Restore. Because Time Machine keeps versioned snapshots, you can even recover an earlier version of a file you overwrote, not just deleted ones. This is the single best reason to have a backup running before disaster strikes.

Step 3: Restore from iCloud or Other Backups

If the file lived in iCloud Drive or Photos, check iCloud.com, where deleted files are recoverable for 30 days. If you back up to a NAS, a cloud service, or a tool like restic, restore from there. Any proper backup is faster and more reliable than recovery software, which is why a good backup routine matters more than any recovery tool.

Step 4: Use Recovery Software

If there’s no backup and the files are genuinely gone, deleted and emptied, or on a corrupted drive, recovery software is your next move. It scans the disk for data that hasn’t yet been overwritten. The sooner you act, the better your chances, since continued use of the drive overwrites the very data you’re trying to recover. Stop using the affected drive immediately.

The tools I’ve tested:

PhotoRec and TestDisk: free and open source. TestDisk repairs damaged partitions and recovers lost ones, while PhotoRec digs out files by signature even when the file system is wrecked. It’s a command-line tool, so it looks intimidating, but if you’re willing to read the manual it’s the most effective recovery tool I’ve used, and it costs nothing.
Disk Drill: a polished, user-friendly option with a free scan so you can see what’s recoverable before paying.
EaseUS Data Recovery: the premium tool that got me results closest to the PhotoRec and TestDisk combo. If you want something straightforward that just works, this is the one I’d recommend.
Data Rescue: a long-standing Mac recovery app aimed at more serious cases.

Between these, PhotoRec and TestDisk is my favourite for the price and effectiveness, and EaseUS is the easiest if you’d rather not touch the command line.

Step 5: When to Call a Professional

If the drive is physically failing, clicking, not mounting, or making unusual noises, stop and don’t run recovery software on it. Physical failures need a data-recovery lab with a clean room, and every extra minute the drive runs risks making the damage permanent. It’s expensive, but for genuinely irreplaceable data it’s the only safe option.

Prevention Beats Recovery

Recovery software is a last resort, never a strategy. Two habits save you almost every time:

Run real backups. A Time Machine drive plus an off-site copy means most “lost” files are a two-minute restore, not a frantic scan. See my complete Mac backup guide.
Format memory cards in-camera before each use, rather than just deleting files. Starting from a clean, properly structured card reduces corruption and makes any future recovery far cleaner.

Get the backups right and file recovery becomes something you rarely have to think about. Skip them and you’ll eventually be running scans and hoping, the version of this problem nobody wants.