Computer

How to recover lost files after macOS update?

Technology is amazing and has made our lives easier. What involved hours of rigorous work can now be done with a few clicks on your Mac computer. While the Mac saves a lot of time and efforts, many Mac users have encountered data loss after upgrading macOS. How to troubleshoot this issue? This post will shed a light on it.

1. Have a look at other folders

Upon upgrading your macOS, there are chances of files and folders stored at the root level to get relocated. You can check for your files in the folder  /Library/SystemMigration/History/Migration-UUID/QuarantineRoot/ after you have updated your macOS. It is highly likely that you would find the relocated files here. Upon finding your data, you can heave a sigh of relief!

2. Use Time Machine app to restore lost data

You can use an app to recover lost data. Time Machine is one such app that can restore your files and even your entire Mac. However, for that to work, you must have prior Time Machine backups. If you have them you are safe. You need to follow the following the steps mentioned below and recover the lost data.

For restoring lost files and folders, you would need to

  • Open Launchpad and click ‘Other’.
  • Find Time Machine and open it.
  • Look at the backups with the help of the arrows at the bottom.
  • You can then select the files or folders you want to restore and click on ‘Restore’.

In case it is your Mac that has crashed after the upgrade, you have to make use of the Time Machine backups in order to restore Mac.

Here is how you do that,

  • Restart Mac, press Command+R keys at the same time. You will see your Mac booting in the macOS Recovery mode and you can see the macOS Utilities window. In case this doesn’t happen, you have to try again.
  • Under the macOS Utilities, you should select Restore from Time Machine Backup after which you have to click on continue.
  • Go through the information on the Restore Your System page and click on ‘continue’.
  • You can see the different backup versions. Select the hard disk’s latest backup and click on ‘continue’. Upon doing so, your Mac will get restored.
  • The final step would be to restart the system once.

3. Use iCloud backup to recover the lost files

This method will come to your rescue when the Time Machine Restore doesn’t work out or appears to be disabled. iOS and Mac computers have iCloud Drives as the most commonly used cloud storage service and you must be knowing about it already. People make a good use of it for storing and syncing files across devices.

The main reason for the usage of iCloud storage is to save the storage space of the Mac device. iCloud has a restore feature and with that you can easily recover the data you have lost or accidentally deleted. This includes media files like photos and videos, contacts, calendars, bookmarks and reminders.

Here is how to recover the lost files,                                                

  • Visit iCloud.com and log in.
  • Find the ‘Setting’ icon and click on it. Go to the bottom of the page that opens.
  • Find ‘Advanced’ at the bottom left of the page and click on ‘Restore Files’.
  • Select the files that you want to restore or simply go in for ‘select all’ if you want to recover everything.
  • Next, click on ‘Restore’ and you will get all your lost files and folders.

4. Use data recovery software to get lost files and folders back

If the above mentioned methods do not work, you don’t need to panic. There is still a way out and that is using data recovery software. While there are several such software in the market, you should choose the one that is the best in its class. One such software is iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.

With iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac, you can recover the files you have lost in the following scenarios

  • After a macOS Update
  • After downgrading macOS

Apart from that, you can recover lost data from the startup disk of Mac using this software. iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac will come in handy when your Mac doesn’t boot after getting updated.

The software is a wonderful APFS data recovery software that helps in recovering the files that have been deleted recently. It also helps in recovering lost files from APFS volumes/drives that are formatted, corrupted and inaccessible.

iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac works well on hard drives, USB flash drives, memory cards, SD cards, CF cards, and the like. Also, the software supports all the file formats. Using the software is an easy way to recover the data you have lost after a macOS update.

The Final Word

The files and folders stored in your devices are quite important and they even have information that you can’t do without. It is therefore important to back up all of them when you choose to update your system. However, if you fail to do so and end up losing data there is still hope as there are 4 ways of recovering the files and folders you have lost. They are rather easy and will deliver the desired results.

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