I've completely lost my notes on iCloud and I've tried everything to recover them. Here's what happened: On Tuesday, a coworker sent me a note, and when I tried to open it, I agreed to sync with my messages. The note showed up, and I decided I didn't need that option on my phone anymore, so I turned it off. Fast forward to Friday, I opened my notes app to share something with a friend, only to find every single note under 'iCloud' was wiped out. Even those in 'Recently Deleted' are gone! After searching for solutions online, I only managed to recover two random notes from years ago.
I went to the Apple Store on Saturday, but they told me I had no iCloud backup because I didn't pay for the service. They could only reset the app, risking losing everything on my phone. Today, I spent 85 minutes on the phone with support trying to see if I could restore from a backup on my old Windows laptop, but iTunes says it has no backups for my new phone. I've lost over 100 notes, including writing that meant a lot to me and recipes from my family. I'm at a loss and don't want to believe that all my important data is gone. How can Apple identify details about my phone but not help me recover important notes?
5 Answers
It’s a tough lesson about backup practices. Remember that if you share notes between accounts and one is deleted, it can vanish across all devices. Have you thought about using iMazing or a similar tool? It might help recover some notes unless iTunes cooperates.
I'm really sorry you're going through this! Sometimes syncing can cause deletions across devices if you don’t have everything set up right. Have you considered looking for old backups or even older devices? They might still have your notes.
I get your frustration, but iCloud should only cost $0.99 per month for extra storage unless you're looking at something more extensive that you really don’t need. You might want to check that again because most people find it's relatively cheap for what you get.
It's rough, but honestly, this kind of thing happens when you don't regularly back up your device. If iCloud isn't your thing, remember that Apple lets you back up to your computer too. In 2025, we all should be regularly backing up our stuff! It's just part of being a smartphone user nowadays.
It sounds like you might have just unsynced your notes from your account, which could mean they're still stored on that account even if they aren't visible on your phone. Double-check all your mail accounts in Settings and see if toggling the notes option restores them!
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