3 Methods to Recover Videos from Formatted SD Card

Need to Recover Videos from Formatted SD Card

SD cards are popular in many storage devices, such as digital cameras, music players, smartphones, etc and are used to store videos & other files. However, sometimes you may be asked to format disk before using it, you might instinctively click yes to format it, resulting in data loss.

Now you may worry about your video files. Relax! Your videos are still there and recoverable. Please stop writing new data to it and recover videos from formatted SD card as soon as possible. And this article will introduce you to 3 effective ways and the best practice to prevent video loss in SD cards.

Simplest Method to Recover Video Files from Formatted SD Card

To recover videos from a formatted SD card, the easiest way is using one professional data recovery software. MyRecover is a good choice for Windows 7, 8, 10, 11, etc, and Windows Server. Below are some excellent features you will use:

• Support two advanced scanning methods - Quick Scan & Deep Scan. It is able to find out all video files from formatted SD card as well as other data loss scenarios, such as accidental deletion, virus infection, system crash, etc.
• Recover different video formats without losing quality, such as MPEG/MPG/MP4, MOV, AVI/NAVI, ASF, WMV, RM/RMX, FLV/F4V QSV, etc.
• Except for video files, you can also recover Word documents, Excel files, PPT, pictures, compressed files, etc, and more than 200+ file types. 

Now download this Windows data recovery software- MyRecover and install it on your Windows PC.

Step 1. Launch Windows data recovery software- MyRecover. Hover the mouse over the formatted SD card saved deleted files before, and click Scan.

Step 2. The software will automatically scan the selected SD card and display all files including videos on it. To find out deleted video files quickly, click Filter > Type and select Videos. In addition, you can specify video size, such as less than 128KB to 128KB ~1MB to 1MB ~ 512MB and above, or custom.

Step 3. Select the video files you want to recover and click Recover xxx files. You don’t need to wait for the final scanning result if all of your videos on the formatted SD card are there.  

Note: MyRecover displays the number of video files to be recovered and their full size. You can use this to determine if you have selected all videos on the formatted SD card.

Step 4. Select a new folder to store all the recovered video files on the formatted SD card. Then, confirm it and click Select Folder. It will automatically recover the selected videos on this folder. Don’t save them to original location as it may cause data corruption or permanent data loss.

Notes:

• MyRecover allow users to recover video files from flash drive, SD card, external disk, etc, up to 500MB. To recover unlimited files, try advanced editions.
• Not only video files, you can also use this software to retrieve Excel files, Word documents, PPT files and more.
• This software also helps to handle different data loss scenarios well. So you can use it to recover deleted video files from a flash drive, fix RAW SD card without formatting, etc.

Other Two Common Methods to Recover Deleted Video Files from SD Card

Besides data recovery software, two other methods worth trying are using the CHKDSK command and backup software.

Way 1: Perform SD Card Video Recovery with CMD

Step 1. Press Win + R to open the Run window. Then, type cmd and click OK to access command prompt with administrator priority.

Step 2. Type chkdsk G: /f /r or chkdsk G: /f /r /x and press Enter.

Notes:

• The /f and /r parameters helps to find disk errors and fix it.
• The /x parameter is able to mark bad sectors and recover readable information.

You may be able to get your video files back. But if this SD card becomes RAW, you will receive error message like “The type of the file system is RAW. CHKDSK is not available for RAW drives.”, and result into data loss.

Way 2: Restore from File History Backup

Step 1. Go to Control Panel > System and Security and click File History.

Step 2. Select Restore personal files. It will open file history recovery window and display the most recent backup copies of your files.

Step 3. Check if the deleted video files are there. If not, click the left arrow to locate them in earlier version. Click the green restore button to get them back once you found your videos.

The Best Practice to Protect Against Video Loss on SD Card

With the above methods, you can easily recover videos from formatted SD card. But sometimes this video loss can be avoided if you use SD card properly, such as don’t often use SD card on multiple devices, etc.

In fact, creating a backup of your video files with free backup software for Windows - AOMEI Backupper Standard is the best practice to protect them. It gives you a chance to restore videos from backup when you find you accidentally delete them or they are on a formatted SD card.

Step 1. Launch Windows backup software - AOMEI Backupper Standard. Then, click Backup and select File Backup subsequently.

Step 2. Type a task me if you want to distinguish it from other backup tasks. Then, click Add File or Add Folder to select video files on your SD card.

Step 3. Click the folder-shaped button and select a new location to store your videos. It can be another SD card or other recognized devices, such as internal or external disk, USB drive, , network drive, etc. Finally, click Start Backup.

Note: If you want to back up all the newly added videos on this SD card automatically, select Disk Backup in the first step to include everything on it and set a scheduled backup option to make it run automatically.

FAQs

✍ How to recover deleted video files on Windows 11?

The deleted video files on Windows 11 will be moved to the Recycle Bin folder before it’s deleted permanently. So if you delete them recently, check the Recycle Bin now.

✍ Is it possible to recover video from a formatted SD card? 

The answer is YES. Because video on a formatted SD card will not be completely deleted. Windows has two formatting method, of which, the default quick format method only delete files on it and mark the occupied space as free for new data.

✍ How can I recover videos from a formatted SD card for free?

If your video files are smaller than 500MB, you can recover videos from formatted SD card free with MyRecover. It’s a powerful data recovery software for Windows 7, 8, 10, 11, etc and Windows Server.