Data recovery is an essential aspect of the Android experience and something that every Android user should know how to perform. The need for data recovery typically arises when you factory reset your smartphone. Factory resets are a common solution to unexpected malfunctions that are caused due to unknown reasons. A reset wipes all data from your phone. Here are the top 4 ways you can recover your data after performing a factory reset on your Android smartphone.
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Restore data from a local backup
If you keep your personal data backed up locally, you will not have any trouble restoring it after a factory reset of your Android phone. Local backups can be created on a memory card, a pen drive, an external hard drive, or even on your PC. Creating a local backup is recommended for personal data like photos, videos, and documents like your IDs, books, and more. Stuff like chat history, contacts, and apps are more suited for an online backup. Here’s how you recover your data using a local backup after performing a factory reset on your Android smartphone.
Step 1: Connect your Android phone to your PC or laptop using a USB cable. If you have created a local backup of your data on a pen drive or an external hard disk, make sure you copy it on your PC first. If the backup was created on a memory card, insert it on your smartphone and skip this step.
Step 2: On your Android smartphone, go to Settings>Accounts and backup, and select ‘External storage transfer’.
Step 3: Locate the backup on your computer or memory card and click on ‘Restore’.
Restore data from an online backup
Cloud storage services like Google Drive and Dropbox come in extremely handy to create an online backup of your data at a very nominal cost. Google Drive offers the first 15GB of storage free of cost. For a lot of users, 15GB is enough to back up all the important stuff from their phone. Creating an online backup has its own advantages. Firstly, you can automatically sync your data and update the backup, without needing to check on it every other week. Secondly, creating an online backup gets rid of the hassle of always plugging in an external storage device and backing data up manually. Here’s how you can recover your data from an online backup.
Step 1: Launch your phone after performing a factory reset.
Step 2: Login using the Google Account in which you backed up all your data.
Step 3: While setting up your device, tap on the ‘Restore backup’ option.
Step 4: Tap on ‘Automatic restore’ to recover your backed-up data from Google Drive.
If you skipped the restore option while setting up your device, go to Settings>Accounts and backup and select ‘Restore data’.
Recover data from your device using DroidKit
If you do not have an updated backup for your data, there is still a way to recover it after performing a reset on your Android phone. Android tools like DroidKit have special functions that let you recover lost data on your device. Follow these steps to restore data on your phone using DroidKit.
Step 1: Download and install DroidKit on your PC from here.
Step 2: Click on ‘Quick recovery from device’ under the ‘Data Recovery’ section.
Step 3: Select the kind of data you want to recover.
Step 4: Connect your Android smartphone to your PC using a USB cable. Make sure USB debugging is enabled on your phone. You can read how to enable it here.
Step 5: Let DroidKit deep scan your device for deleted data.
Step 6: Go through the selected data and select the files you want to keep. You can choose to keep the files on your PC or on the phone.
Step 7: Unplug your phone after data has been recovered.
Recover data using Dr.Fone
Dr.Fone is another great tool to recover data after performing a factory reset on your Android phone. Here’s how you can use it.
Step 1: Download and install Dr.Fone on your PC from here.
Step 2: Launch Dr.Fone and select ‘Data Recovery’.
Step 3: Enable USB debugging on your Android phone (read here) and connect it to your PC using a USB cable.
Step 4: Select the type of file you want to recover.
Step 5: Click on ‘Start’ and let Dr.Fone scan your device for lost data.
Step 6: Once the scan is complete, you can go through the recovered files and save them on your phone individually or all at once.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can data be recovered after a factory reset on Android?
You can recover data from a local or online backup after a factory reset on your Android phone. If you haven’t backed up your data, you can use tools like Dr.Fone and DroidKit to restore your lost data.
How to restore data after a factory reset without backup?
If you haven’t created a backup of the data on your phone, you can use tools like DroidKit and Dr.Fone to recover it after performing a factory reset.
Does factory reset restore the Android version?
No. A factory reset simply wipes all data from your device and restores the settings back to how they were when your phone was unboxed. A factory reset does not restore the Android version on your phone.
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Conclusion
These are the top 5 ways to recover data after performing a factory reset on your Android smartphone. For smooth and lossless data recovery, we’d recommend creating frequent backups of your data. The easiest way to do this is by enabling auto-backup on your Google account. While tools like Dr.Fone and DroidKit are highly efficient, they are not always flawless and may throw errors while scanning your phone for lost data.
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