How to Recover Permanently Deleted Google Drive Files and Folders

The good thing about Google Drive’s file management is the recycle bin. Any deleted file or folder will stay in the trash bin for 30 days, which is enough for most users to recover accidentally deleted files. Just right-click the deleted file in the Recycle Bin and select Restore to restore the file.

But what if you have accidentally emptied the trash bin by mistake and now want to recover permanently deleted files in Google Drive? Then you are at the right place because, in this article, you will find some effective solutions to solve this problem.

How to Recover Permanently Deleted Files From Google Drive?

Google Drive is one of the most popular cloud storage services that offers you 15 GB of free storage. You can use this space to store your important files, photos, videos, etc., and access them from anywhere. But sometimes, you may accidentally delete some important files from Google Drive or empty your bin, which can be a very frustrating experience.

Suppose you have deleted some important files (including photos, videos, documents, and more) and want to know how to recover permanently deleted Google Drive files. In that case, you can follow the methods given below.

Check if the Files Are in the Bin

When you delete files from Google Drive, they are not permanently deleted but moved to the Recycle Bin. So, if you accidentally deleted some files, you can check the Bin to see if the files are still there. To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

First, open Google Drive and click the “Bin” option from the left sidebar.

Now, check if the deleted files are present in the Bin. If yes, then select the files and click on the Restore option.

This will move the selected files back to your Google Drive account.

Try GoogleDrive Support

If the files are not present in the Bin or you have emptied the Bin, you can try contacting Google Drive support to see if they can help you recover the deleted files. To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

First, open your web browser and go to the Google Drive Help page.

Now, search for Find or Recover a file in the search bar. Scroll down and click Request file recovery.

Now you will be prompted to sign in to your Google account. Enter your credentials and log in to your account.

After logging in, Google will redirect you to the next page, where you need to provide some information about the deleted files.

Fill in the form, check the consent box and click on “Submit.”

You will receive an email from drive-noreply@google.com confirming that your request has been received.

Google will also send you another email when your deleted files have been recovered. You can find your permanently deleted files and folders in their original location.

Important things to know when using Google support to recover files:

• You can only recover files that have been deleted within the last 20 days.
• Google can only help you recover files that you own.
• Google cannot help you recover files if you are not the owner.
• Google cannot help you recover files from Gmail or Google Photos.

Recover Files Using G-Suite Admin Console

If you have a Google workplace account or are using G-Suite, you can use Admin Console to recover permanently deleted files.

If you have a workspace account that your organization or college manages, the administrator of your account can help you recover your deleted files through the Admin console. To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

First, log in to your Google Workspace account.

Now click on the “Admin Console” option.

After that, click on “User” and select the user whose data you want to restore.

Now click on the three dots and then on “Restore Data.”

In the next window, you will be asked to specify the time period in which you want to restore the data.

Lastly, set the application as Drive and then tap “Recover“.

Recover Files From a Deleted Google Account

You may need data from a Google account that was deleted some time ago. In this case, you can contact Google’s Data Recovery team to see if they can help you recover the deleted files. To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

First, recover and restore the deleted user account. Now go to the Drive of the deleted user account.

Locate the file or folder you want to recover and share it with your Google account. You can also transfer the ownership of the data by following these steps:

Open the file or folder and click on “Share” in the upper right corner.

Enter the email address of your Google account and click “Send.”

Now click the three dots next to your account and click “Transfer Ownership.”

After transferring ownership, you can delete the old user account again.

Recover Data From Overwritten Documents

Sometimes, we accidentally overwrite an existing document in our Google Drive and want to restore our old data. In such cases, you can use the version history feature of Google documents.

Just open the document you accidentally overwrote and click “File” in the upper left corner.

From the drop-down menu, choose “See Revision History.”

A new window will open where you can see the document’s revision history.

To restore an old version, simply click on the three dots next to the version in question and then on “Restore this version“.

Recover Files and Folders Using From Shared Team Drive

You can share data with your team using Team Drive on Google Workspaces. If you accidentally deleted a file from Team Drive, you can use this method to recover it.

To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

First, log in to the Google Admin Console.

Now navigate to Apps > G Suite > Drive and Docs.

Click “Manage Team Drives” and locate the file you want to restore.

Once you have found the file, click the Restore icon in the upper right corner of the File tab.

You can also search for files in a specific date range by specifying the date range and then recovering the data.

Recover Permanently Deleted Files Using Google vault

Google Vault is a feature of G Suite that lets you preserve, store, search and export data to meet your organization’s compliance needs. If you accidentally delete a file in your Google Vault, you can easily restore it. To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

Sign in to your Google Vault account.

Click the “Matters” option on the left and select the folder where you have saved the data you want to recover.

Now click “Search” and select “Drive” as the type of application data you want to search for.

Then enter the details of the user who lost the files and the file type, and click the “Search” button.

Finally, click “Export Results” to export and download all the files (the files will be downloaded in a zip file).

Watch this video for a better understanding of the process: How to Restore Permanently Deleted Files Using Google Vault

Recover Data Using Google Takeout

If you have data stored on your Drive but cannot access it, you can use the Google Takeout feature to download all the data at once. To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

Sign in to your Google account and click “Data and Privacy” on the left side.

Scroll down to the “Download or delete your data” section and click on “Download your data.”

Now select the applications from which you want to download the data and click “Next Step.”

Select the transfer method and enter the other details as you like.

Click the “Create Transport” button.

Third-Party Google Drive Recovery Software

Google Drive itself may not be the best solution for your backups, as it is an online service where data loss can occur. Therefore, you should always have a backup of your Google Drive data on your local storage and use backup cloud storage services like SysCloud. You can also use a recovery tool like Cisdem to restore data from local folders.

Recover Drive Data Using SysCloud

If you have backed up your data to SysCloud and data has been lost, you can use the SysCloud Restore feature to restore it. To do this, you need to perform the following steps:

First, log in to the SysCloud application.

Now, click on the “Backup” option in the menu bar and select “Archive & Restore” from the drop-down menu.

In the search bar, search for the user whose data has been lost. Select the “Drive” option under the user name.

Now select the files and folders you want to restore and click the “Restore” button.

Your files and folders will be restored to their original location.

Recover Drive files Using Cisdem

If you are not able to restore data from Google drive by any means, you need to find the other way around. You might have saved the file you are interested in on your local system before moving it to your Google Drive. In such a case, you can use Cisdem Data Recovery to scan your system and find the file of your interest, and then you can recover the data. To do this, you need to follow the steps below:

First, download Cisdem Data Recovery and launch it on your system.

Go to Disk Data Recovery and select the volume in which you lost the File.

Now click on the “Scan” button to start scanning.

When the scanning gets completed, you will see all the lost files on your screen.

Now restore the files on your local or to the cloud.

Google Drive Recovery Made Easy

Data is important to any business, and data loss can lead to a variety of problems. To prevent data loss, you should always have a backup copy of your data on your local storage or with a cloud backup service. Services like CBackup, SysCloud, and CloudBerry offer great features for backing up data to the cloud. You should also use a recovery program like Cisdem Data Recovery to recover lost data from your system.

You can recover your permanently deleted files from Google Drive using the methods described in this article. Keep in mind that you cannot recover data that was deleted more than 25 days ago. Also, no method is foolproof, so you should always have a backup of your data to be on the safe side.

I hope this article helped you understand how to recover your permanently deleted files in Google Drive. If you still have questions, feel free to ask them in the comments below.

FAQs About Permanently Deleted Files in Google Drive