If you’ve deleted messages from your iPhone and later decide that you want them back, there are several ways you can try to recover them. This applies to both regular SMS messages, which are sent through your mobile carrier, and iMessages, which are sent over the internet and appear in the Messages app.
The easiest way to recover deleted messages is to use the “Recently Deleted” folder. There is one important catch, though: deleted messages are moved to this folder and kept there for 30 days. After 30 days, they are automatically and permanently deleted. Also, if you manually delete a message from the “Recently Deleted” folder, it cannot be recovered.
There is another option, although it probably won’t be useful for most people: restoring your messages from an iCloud backup. To be honest, I don’t know many people who regularly back up their data these days.
How to restore messages in the messages app
To restore deleted messages directly from the Messages app, make sure they are still available in the Recently Deleted folder.
- Open the Messages app on your iPhone.
- At the top of the conversation list, tap Edit, then select Recently Deleted.
- Select the conversations containing the messages you want to restore, then tap Restore.
- Tap Restore Messages to confirm.
The restored messages will reappear in the conversation list in the Messages app.
If you use Messages in iCloud, any messages or conversations you restore on your iPhone will also be restored on your other Apple devices where Messages in iCloud is enabled.
Note: Messages are deleted and restored only on your iPhone and other Apple devices signed in to the same Apple Account.
If you restore a locked conversation in which not all participants have iMessage enabled, incoming messages will no longer be automatically deleted.
How to retrieve deleted messages via the iCloud recovery
If you regularly back up your iPhone to iCloud, you can restore your messages by reverting to a previous backup.
- Open Settings > Your Name > iCloud >iCloud Backup.
- Check the date of your most recent backup to ensure it contains the deleted messages.
- Before proceeding, back up any new data to avoid losing it.
- Go to Settings > General > Transfer or Reset iPhone > Erase All Content and Settings.
- Follow the on-screen instructions to set up your device and select Restore from iCloud Backup.
Warning: Restoring from an iCloud backup replaces your current data with the contents of the backup. This method is rather inconvenient, so you’ll have to do everything twice: roll back to the old version and then go back to the latest version so you don’t lose the latest data.
