How to recover deleted files on a laptop

Quick answer: what to do first

1. Stop. Do not save, download, install or copy anything to the drive the files were on. When Windows deletes a file, the space is marked as free, but the data often stays until new data is written over it.
2. Do not restart or run cleanup tools if you can avoid it, and never run a "disk cleaner" or "optimiser".
3. Work through the easy places in the sections below: Recycle Bin, undo, previous versions, cloud, email, program autosave.
4. If the files matter a great deal and the easy places fail, stop here and ask a technician rather than experimenting.

How recoverable your files are depends on what happened (a simple delete, a format, a failing drive), how long ago it was, how much you have used the drive since, and the type of drive. Hard drives usually give better odds than SSDs for the reason explained below.

Method 1: Check the Recycle Bin

1. Double-click the Recycle Bin icon on the desktop. If it is missing, open File Explorer, click the address bar, type Recycle Bin and press Enter.
2. Use the search box at the top right, or click View and choose Details so you can sort by Date deleted.
3. Right-click the file or folder and choose Restore. It returns to the place it came from. To restore many files, select them (hold Ctrl) and choose Restore the selected items.

If the bin is empty, you or Windows emptied it, or the files were deleted another way, such as Shift + Delete or from a drive that does not use the bin. Go to the next methods. Storage Sense, if switched on (Settings, System, Storage), can also empty the bin automatically after a period.

Method 2: Undo the delete or the move right away

If you deleted something a moment ago, open the same folder in File Explorer and press Ctrl + Z, or right-click an empty area and choose Undo Delete (also Undo Move, Undo Rename). It works only for the last action or few actions in that session.

Also check whether the file was moved by accident rather than deleted. Type the file name into the File Explorer search box with This PC selected, and look in other folders such as Downloads, Desktop and Documents. A file saved to a different location is a very common "loss".

Method 3: Restore a previous version

Windows can keep earlier copies of files through File History or System Restore points, if those were turned on before you lost the file.

1. In File Explorer, go to the folder where the deleted file used to be.
2. Right-click an empty space in the folder and choose Properties (on Windows 11 you may need to click Show more options first).
3. Open the Previous Versions tab. If you see a list of dates, select the latest one before the deletion and click Open to see what it contains.
4. Drag the file you need to your desktop or click Restore carefully (restoring the whole folder can overwrite newer files).

If the tab is empty, nothing was saved. To prevent this in future, turn on File History: open Control Panel, choose File History, connect an external drive and click Turn on. It then saves copies of your files regularly.

Method 4: Look in your cloud storage and email

• OneDrive: sign in at onedrive.live.com, open the Recycle bin in the left panel, select the file and choose Restore. Deleted OneDrive files are kept for a limited time, generally 30 days for personal accounts, and you can also use Restore your OneDrive to roll back many changes.
• Google Drive: open drive.google.com, click Trash, right-click the file and choose Restore. Files in the trash are deleted permanently after about 30 days.
• Dropbox and others: check the Deleted files section of the website.
• Email: search your Sent and Inbox for the file name or for attachments. Many people email documents to themselves or others.
• WhatsApp and Telegram: files you sent or received are in the chat and often still available to download again. WhatsApp Web also keeps downloaded files in your Downloads folder.
• Other devices: check your phone, a flash drive, a colleague's computer or a printer scan folder.

Method 5: Recover an unsaved or overwritten Office document

If the loss was a Word, Excel or PowerPoint document that you did not save, or saved over, try these steps before anything else.

1. Open the program and choose File, then Info, then Manage Document (or Manage Workbook), then Recover Unsaved Documents. A folder of auto-saved files opens.
2. When you reopen Word after a crash, look for the Document Recovery panel on the left and choose the latest version.
3. Search the whole computer for files ending in .asd or .wbk (Word autosave and backups) and for files starting with a tilde, such as ~$name or ~name.tmp.
4. If the document is in OneDrive or SharePoint, right-click it and choose Version history to restore an earlier version.

Method 6: Use recovery software, carefully

Recovery programs scan the drive for data that is no longer listed in folders but has not been overwritten yet. Microsoft offers a free command-line tool, Windows File Recovery, in the Microsoft Store. Several well-known third-party programs have friendlier interfaces. Be careful with whichever you choose.

Rules that apply to every recovery program:

1. Install it on a different drive, such as a flash drive, not on the drive that holds the lost files. Installing to the same drive can overwrite them.
2. Save recovered files to a different drive, never back to the same one.
3. Download only from the official site of the maker. Cracked versions and "free recovery tool" ads are common ways to catch malware.
4. Do a quick scan first, then a deep scan if needed, and be patient, because deep scans take a long time.
5. Check the results. Recovered files may have generic names and some may be damaged. Open each to confirm it works.

Using Windows File Recovery

This needs Windows 10 version 2004 or later. Install it from the Microsoft Store, open Start, type Windows File Recovery and run it as administrator. Then type a command in this format: winfr C: D: /regular /n \Users\yourname\Documents\*.docx. This looks on drive C: for deleted Word files in your Documents and saves them to drive D:, a different drive. The /regular mode suits recently deleted files on a normal drive. For older deletions or a formatted drive, the /extensive mode searches more thoroughly and is slower. Recovered files go into a folder named Recovery on the destination drive.

Why SSDs and long delays reduce your chances

On a hard drive, deleted data often stays in place until something overwrites it. On most modern SSDs, Windows uses a feature called TRIM, which tells the drive which blocks are free so that it can erase them in the background. Once erased, those blocks hold nothing to recover, and no software can bring them back. This often happens soon after deletion. That is why quick action matters most on laptops with SSDs and why an SSD that was just emptied can leave you with little to recover.

Other factors that lower your odds:

• Using the laptop heavily after the deletion, because browsing, downloading and updates all write data.
• Encrypted drives (such as BitLocker). You need the encryption key or recovery key to read anything.
• Time. Recovery is better in hours than in weeks.
• A failing drive. Running scans over and over on a dying drive can make it worse.

Make sure it never happens again: a simple backup plan

Recovery is uncertain, but backups are not. A reliable plan is called 3-2-1: three copies, on two kinds of storage, with one away from the laptop.

1. Copy one: your laptop.
2. Copy two: an external drive. Turn on File History, or copy your folders every week. Keep it unplugged between backups so malware or a power surge cannot take both.
3. Copy three: cloud storage. Use OneDrive, Google Drive or similar, and let it sync your Desktop, Documents and Pictures folders. Mind your data bundle for the first upload, and do it on a cheap or Wi-Fi connection.
4. Check it. Once a month, open a file from each backup to confirm it works. A backup you have never tested is only a hope.

Also keep important documents in clearly named folders, and consider a short list of the files that matter most so that you can check them quickly.

Frequently asked questions

Written by the ICT AccessPoint team

We repair laptops and build websites and business systems. Have a question this guide did not answer? Message us.

This guide is general advice. Every device and business is different, so if you are unsure, ask a technician before you act.