How to Recover Deleted Photos from USB Drive (3 Ways)

Help!!! I accidentally deleted photos on USB drive

USB is an excellent choice to save or transfer data, such as photos, videos, documents, etc., thanks to its light, tiny, and portable feature. But where data exists, there is data loss. Here's a real case:

Fear not, your data are still on the disk and recoverable. We will introduce you to two reliable data recovery software and one manual method below.

#1: Recover deleted photos from USB drive with software 

Here we will show you two reliable data recovery software to help you recover deleted photos from USB drives in a few steps. 

🥇Option 1: MyRecover

MyRecover will be one of the most recommended data recovery software to scan and recover pictures from USB drives without effort as it has a user-friendly interface, integrates with powerful scanning algorithms, and supports multiple data loss scenarios and storage devices. 

Then, free download MyRecover and open it. At the same time, you need to connect the USB flash drive to a computer for data recovery. 

Step 1. Hover the mouse over the USB drive, and click Scan to scan.

Step 2. You’ll see all the deleted files and other lost files saved on your USB after scanning. The "Quick Scan" for a faster scan of recently deleted files and the "Deep Scan" for a more thorough search.

Step 3. Check your scanning results and select the photos you need by ticking the checkboxes or leaving them blank. Then click “Recover x files” to start the recovery process.

In addition, you still can use it to recover deleted or lost files from SSD, HDD, external disks, memory cards, and other storage media in the following scenarios.

• Recover files from formatted hard drive
• Recover files deleted by virus
• Recover files from lost partition
• Recover deleted files from Recycle Bin
• Recover permanently deleted files
• ......

Option 2. Windows File Recovery

Released by Microsoft, Windows File Recovery is a free data recovery software that aims to recover lost files from your local storage devices, such as internal and external drives, solid-state drives, USB drives, SD cards. It only works with Windows 10/11.

It's closely linked to the command prompt because there’s no graphical user interface. Therefore, you can use it to recover files using CMD according to the syntax, file system, data loss scenarios, etc.

Step 1. Check the file system. Connect your USB to your PC. Click “This PC” > right-click on the USB > click “Properties” to check it

Step 2. After figuring out your file system, select a mode based on your data loss scenarios and then switches.

Step 3. Click “Get” to download “Windows File Recovery” from the Microsoft Store and install it on your PC.

Step 4. After installation, “Open” it and try to recover deleted photos from USB drive with CMD. 

Step 5. Enter “y” to go on. If you want to stop the recovery process, press “Ctrl + C”. Please wait patiently, you’ll get your recovered photos after the process.

#2: Recover pictures from USB drive without software

If your files are hidden instead of deleted, you can't view them by default. It doesn't matter, you can use CMD to recover the hidden files from USB. The Attrib command can assist you in modifying and changing file attributes (read-only, hidden, system, and archive). Here's how:

Step 1. Connect the USB to your PC. Then, type “cmd” in the search bar, and select “Run as administrator”.

Step 2. Copy “attrib –h –r –s /s /d G:\*.*” in the window and hit “Enter”. Please replace the letter G with the real drive letter of your USB.

Step 3. After the process, you’ll find these retrieved photos saved in a new folder on your USB. If needed, change its chk format and store it at your destination place.

✨Bonus tips: Practical tricks for data loss prevention

This part offers you some practical tricks for data loss prevention. Moreover, it’s better to act than to think. If you are unwilling to suffer data loss, follow a pertinent suggestion at once!

Compared with the first three Windows features, restoring data with the last free backup software seems easier. 

Conclusion 

This article describes 3 easy and effective methods to recover deleted photos from USB drive successfully. Among them, using reliable data recovery software like MyRecover will be much easier. Free download it to have a try.

The software has an intuitive interface, and there is no need to learn any CMD, you just need to move your fingers. At the same time, it comes with many useful features, such as file preview, recover files while scanning, file filter, etc., making the recovery process go smoothly.