I was using my Canon 6d and accidentally hit format on my SanDisk 128GB SD card It had all my vacation photos and some video clips I really need. I didn’t save them anywhere else. Is there any way to recover them? I haven’t taken any new photos since. Please help, this is super important to me
Update: Find my CR2 files with the data recovery tool. easy to use. Read this guide if you encounter similar problems.
Yes, you can still recover your photos and videos since you haven’t taken new photos after formatting.
I would recommend Stellar Photo Recovery software for recovering your lost photos and videos. Just connect your SD card to your computer with a card reader, run the software, select your SD card, and scan for deleted files. Once the scan completes, preview and save your recovered photos and videos to your computer.
Act quickly as this will improve your recovery chances.
As @Ellinor_William suggested, You can likely recover your photos and videos since you haven’t taken any new ones after formatting the SD card. First, stop using the card immediately to avoid overwriting the data. Remove it from your camera and connect it to a computer using a card reader. Then, use professional data recovery software like Stellar Data Recovery, EaseUS, Disk Drill, and SanDisk RescuePRO to recover the lost files. Just install the software on your computer (not the card), run a scan, and save the recovered files to your computer—not back to the SD card.
Now, avoid transferring or copying files onto the SD card, installing software on it, or reformatting it. Using file recovery software on your computer as soon as possible will help you recover the lost files. Connect the SD card to your Windows computer and use software like iBoysoft Data Recovery or PhotoRec to perform a deep scan. Recover your vacation photos and video clips to your computer or another external disk (Do not restore them to the SD card, as this will cause data overwriting and make file recovery impossible)."
Hey @Daniel,
Since you haven’t added anything new to the card, there’s a good chance you can still recover your photos and videos. If you haven’t tried any recovery software before, I’d suggest starting with a free version—just to scan the card and see what it finds.
Some tools let you preview the files before recovery, so you’ll know in advance whether your data is actually recoverable. Just make sure you don’t save anything back onto the SD card. Give it a shot and let me know if you need help along the way.
7-zip can make a TAR file of a SD card easily which is easy store and easy to get at images. The TAR file can be opened in Windows but 7-zip is far faster. I use it to backup everything.