How to Recover Deleted Photos from Facebook? (8 Solutions)

Data Recovery

Recover Deleted Facebook Photos Easily

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Have you ever been in a situation that you’ve deleted some Facebook photos, or a Facebook post that contained a precious photo, even your Facecbook account, and want to get them back? The good news is, it is possible to recover. In this guide, we will look at 8 ways to recover deleted Facebook photos on iPhone & Android, Windows & Mac computer, including those Facebook photos from years ago.

Key Takeaways

• It is possible to recover deleted photos from Facebook, as long as the photos were uploaded in a post that was recently deleted, or there was once a backup for the deleted Facebook photos.
• Facebook itselt provides 4 solution to recover deleted photos: check Trash, retrieve from Facebook archive, cancel account deletion or contact support.
• To recover deleted photos from Android or iPhone, you can also check Recently Deleted folder from gallery, or use a 3rd party data recovery program to restore.
• To recover deleted photos from Facebook on PC or Mac, you can use Cisdem Data Recovery when the back up is deleted, or restore from a backup via File History on Windows, and Time Machine on Mac.

 Cisdem Data Recovery for Windows and Mac

Recover Deleted Facebook Photos, Even from Years Ago

• Recover both recently and permanently deleted photos from Facebook
• Support all types of image format
• Repair corrupted Facebook pictures and videos
• Locate wanted Facebook photos with filter tools
• Preview recoverable items before recovery
• Recover Facebook photos or videos to preferred location
• Recover lost file from both internal and external storage devices
• Restore 1000+ file types, including photos, videos, audio, documents, emails, bookmarks, etc.
• Additional features: recover unsaved files, repair documents, create disk backup, create bootable OS installer, etc.

Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7 Free Download macOS 10.15 or later

Can You Recover Deleted Facebook Photos?

Yes, you can, but it depends on how you delete the photos on Facebook.

If the Facebook photos are originally uploaded in a post and you delete the post, the photos will be moved to Trash and kept there for 30 days. You can restore the post to recover the Facebook photos within 30 days.

If you delete your Facebook account, things will be different.

There are 2 kinds of Facebook account cancellation: temporarily deactivate and permanently deactivate. For temporarily deactivated account, you can log in to reactivate your account and regain your access to the Facebook photos; for permanently deleted account, you can cancel the deletion within 30 days since you deleted the account, or you can ask help from Facebook photos to restore the photos after 30 days since the deletion, because it may take up to 90 days for Meta to completely delete all the post and photos from your Facebook account.

If you delete the photos from Profile > Your Photos or Albums, yes, the Facebook photos will be permanently deleted, even the post that includes the photos will be permanently deleted as well. But as long as you have a backup, you can easily recover. If you don't have a backup anymore, for example, you've deleted the copies on a disk/device, you can use a professional data recovery program to retrieve the deleted copies.

How to Recover Deleted Photos in Facebook on Android & iPhone?

In this part, we will introduce 6 ways to recover deleted Facebook photos on Android or iPhone. Actually, these methods also apply to recover photos from Facebook by visiting the web version. Let’s check out how.

#1 Recover from Facebook Trash

Facebook employs a policy to auto delete photos after a span of 30 days from its Trash folder, if you have moved the photos or posts containing the photos to Trash and not exceeding 30 days, you should check the Trash folder first to restore:

1. Click on the account avatar, go to Settings & Privacy.
2. Click on Activity log.
3. Then click on Trash.
4. Select the post that contains the deleted photos, click the 3-dot icon and choose Restore to profile.
5. Find the photos in your Facebook timeline, download and save the deleted photos to your device again.

#2 Retrieve Deleted Photos via Facebook Archive

There are 2 options to recover Facebook photos via archive, according to mobile app version or web version.

Option 1. How to retrieve photos from Facebook archive?

In Facebook app, users are allowed to archive a post, so the post won't be visible to others, it can be only seen by you. If you find some photos are missing, you should check the Archive and restore.

1. Tap on the profile pic from your Facebook app on your mobile phone.
2. Tap Settings and privacy > Settings > Activity log.
3. Then tap Archive.
4. Select the archived post and tap Restore to put it back to your profile.

Option 2. How to retrieve photos from Facebook archive?

Aso, web Facebook allows users to archive all the information and activity in an account, then download or transfer the data to a selected location. This includes posts, messages, photos, live videos, short videos, stories, notes, profile information, data logs and so on. If you have archived this information, even if you delete a Facebook photo later, it is still possible to recover, because Facebook keeps the archive for 4 days since it was created, and the backup of the deleted Facebook photo is still available. Facebook archive file will come with a prefix facebook-, you may have downloaded the archive to your device before, search the zip file first, so you don’t have to re-download it. If not, follow these steps to recover your Facebook photos.

1. Log into your Facebook account.
2. Visit Accounts Center at  https://accountscenter.facebook.com/, then go to Account settings > Your information and permissions > Download your information.
3. Select the archive that contains the backup of your deleted Facebook photos from the available downloads, then click Download.
4. Enter your Facebook password.
5. Save the archive zip file to your device. Open the archive file, check the Media subfolder to find the backup photos.

Tips: If you want to archive and back up your Facebook posts, media or activities to avoid data loss, here is the process:

1. Log into your Facebook account, visit Accounts Center at https://accountscenter.facebook.com/.
2. Go to Your information and permissions > Download your information.
3. Click Download or transfer information.
4. Choose the account or profile to get information from and select the information type you want to archive.
5. Click Download to device.
6. Select Date range, media quality, then click Create files. Your information will be ready to download.

#3. Restore from Recently Deleted Folder on Android & iPhone

If you upload photos to Facebook on Android or iPhone, but cannot find them in the photos app, your best hope is to check the recently deleted folder. 

For Android Users

1. Go to Internal Storage > Android.
2. Then go to Trash, select the deleted photos to recover. 

For iPhone Users

1. Open Photos app, go to Albums > Other Albums > Recently Deleted. 

2. Select the deleted photos by tapping on them, Tap Recover. 

#4. Restore Permanently Deleted Facebook Photos on Android & iPhone

What if you cannot find the deleted Facebook photos on iPhone or Android phone? Don’t worry, deleted files will remain on the phone or the memory card until they get overwritten by new data. As soon as you realize you've deleted the photos, you should use a professional data recovery program to recover deleted files from iPhone or Android phone. Such as UltData. It is capable of recovering deleted items (messages, photos, contacts, call history, notes, voice memos, calendar, etc.) from your mobile device or a backup, under all data loss situations. The recovery process is streamlined: connect > scan >recover.

1. Run UltData on your Mac or Windows.
2. Choose Recover from iOS/Android Device, or you can choose other modes if you have backup. 
3. Connect your phone to the computer, then click Start Scan. 
4. Preview the photos, select them and click Recover. 

#5 Cancel Account Deletion

If you’ve temporarily or permanently deleted your Facebook account, but still within 30 days since the deletion, you can cancel the account deletion to regain access to the photos:

1. Log into your Facebook account.
2. Click Yes, continue to Facebook, and the deletion will be cancelled, you will be able to acess your photos, posts in your Facebook account again.

#6 Contact Facebook Support

If it has been more than 30 days since the account deletion, but not exceeding 90 days, you can drop a message to Facebook official account and seek professional suggestions, because it takes up to 90 days for Facebook to erase your information from its server.

How to Recover Deleted Facebook Photos on Windows & Mac, Even Years Ago?

Deleted photos not available in Facebook Trash bin? Luckily, for the reason that we often upload photos to Facebook from our computer or mobile device, there may be a backup for the deleted photos. Even though you don’t keep the backup any more, we still have solutions to make the retrieval feasible.

#1. Recover Permanently Deleted Photos from Facebook Using Cisdem

For Windows and Mac users, if you’ve deleted the Facebook photos from your device permanently, or you deleted them years ago and you don’t know where to restore, just use a professional data recovery program to scan thoroughly on your device and dig deep into every corner to get the files back, for example, Cisdem Data Recovery.

There are several key reasons why Cisdem Data Recovery is our favorite Facebook photo recovery software. It can restore nearly all kinds of image format (JPG/JPEG, TIFF/TIF, PNG, BMP, GIF, PSD, CRW, CR2, NEF, SVG, DWG, etc.), from every kind of device, including Windows PC, Mac, SD Card, Memory Card, USB, HDD, SSD, Fusion Drive, Digital Camera, media player, etc. Not only can Cisdem recover deleted, formatted and lost photos, it can also repair corrupted images in JPG, PNG and other formats.

In addition to photo-friendly features, Cisdem offers impressive tools, it can load search record to resume previous recovery work, it repairs videos in batch, it creates drive backup image to recover files from drive image, it filters and preview files, it repairs documents like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and it can save recovered files to local drive, or cloud platforms like DropBox, OneDrive, pCloud, Box.

How to recover permanently deleted photos from Facebook using Cisdem?

1. Download and install Cisdem Data Recovery on your Windows PC or Mac.
   Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7 Free Download macOS 10.15 or later
2. Choose Hardware Disk or SD Card, then select the volume or partition where you stored the Facebook photos before, click Search for lost files.
3. Go to Type > Picture, filter the photos by image format or enter keywords to search.
4. Double click on the recoverable Facebook photos, preview and select them by checking the box, then click Recover to restore the photos to local folder or cloud.

#2. Recover Deleted Photos from Facebook with Backup

If you have a habit of backing up files on Windows or Mac using the built-in utilities, it will be much easier to recover a deleted photo from Facebook.

For Windows Users

In the case that you use File History to back up the files on your Windows PC to an external storage device, you can restore the deleted Facebook photos as follows:

1. Connect the external hard drive that you use to back up files to your Windows PC.
2. Find File History tool from Control panel, or enter Restore your files with File History in Windows search box to find and open the tool. 
3. Check the photos you want to restore, preview and select the photos.
4. Click Restore to get the deleted Facebook photos back. 

For Mac Users

On a Mac, users can use Time Machine to backup and restore files, as long as they have enabled and set up the backup. Here are the steps for Facebook photos recovery on Mac with backup:

1. Connect the backup drive to Mac.
2. Enter Time Machine by clicking on the icon in the menu bar. 
3. Check and preview the backup photos, you can use the arrows to select a wanted version from the timeline.
4. Click Restore to recover a deleted Facebook photo from backup. 

Or if you have backed up files to cloud storage platforms like iCloud, Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive or others, you can log in and transfer the photos to a device as you like, if you cannot locate the files, don’t forget to check the Trash folder and restore.

FAQs

1. How to recover recently deleted photos on Facebook?

Click on Profile picture, go to Settings & Privacy > Activity log > Trash, select the post that contains the deleted photos, click the 3-dot icon and choose Restore.

2. How to recover deleted profile picture on Facebook?

Tap on your Profile picture in Facebook, then click on Choose profile picture, go to Profile pictures, all the uploaded pictures that you once used as profile picture will be displayed. Choose a previous one to set as your new profile picture, or right click on the picture to export to your device. 

3. How to recover photos from deleted Facebook account?

Log into your Facebook account and click "Yes, continue to Facebook" to cancel the account deletion. Then you will be able to regain access to your photos, posts, profile, etc.

4. Why deleted Facebook photos still viewable?

Because Facebook has a copy of your Facebook information and files on its server, even though you’ve deleted the photos from your Facebook account, the copies are still available in Facebook backup storage, therefore, they are still viewable.

But why Facebook keeps this in its backup system? There might be cases that you mistakenly delete a post or photo but want to recover, or you delete your account but want to re-activate, or other data loss event. Then Facebook backup will come to rescue your data. This is also why you can restore a post or cancel account deletion within 30 days since the deletion. Even you’ve permanently deleted your account, Facebook won’t delete all your information, and it takes up to 90 days to completely remove them from the server.

4. Is there a free Facebook photo recovery app?

There is no free app that is designed to recover deleted photos directly from Facebook, because Facebook has strict rules and guidelines to protect users’ privacy. But if you once backed up the photos on your computer, and it is not long ago, PhotoRec or Recuva is a good choice to recover your Facebook photos for free. However, the recovery rate of free tools is generally lower than those paid ones.

5. How to permanently delete Facebook photos?

There are 2 ways to permanently delete a Facebook photo.

Method 1:

1. Go to your Facebook profile > Photos.
2. Click on the Edit icon and chooses Delete photo.
3. Confirm to delete.

Method 2:

1. Go to the post that contains the photos you want to delete, click on the 3-dot icon and choose Move to trash.
2. Go to Settings & Privacy > Activity log > Trash.
3. Click on the 3-dot icon beside the post, then choose Delete to permanently delete the post, including the photos. 

Conclusion

We’ve listed several methods to recover deleted photos from Facebook, on a mobile phone or on a computer, no matter they were deleted years ago or permanently deleted, we can use backup or professional tools to retrieve the deleted items. A dedicated data recovery app makes file recovery easier and it just runs quietly on your device to dig out the deleted items fast. Not backing up data is one of the common reasons to make file recovery complicated, therefore, always back up files to external device or cloud.