How to Retrieve Old Voice Memos from iPhone

How to retrieve old voice memos from iPhone? Read this guide to learn 4 practical ways to perform data recovery in voice memos from iPhone.

Kelsey by Kelsey Updated November 21, 2023
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How do I restore voice memos on my iPhone?

Your iPhone's voice memos may have kept a lot of valuable audio and voice messages, but sometimes you may have lost these old voice memos accidentally due to cleaning up iPhone storage space, iOS update, iPhone broken or other reasons. While you regret and feel remorseful, you may also be thinking: how do I restore voice memos on my iPhone?

In general, no matter what causes the loss of voice memos, you still have a high chance to get these voice memos back from your iPhone. This guide shares 4 useful methods of how to retrieve old voice memos from iPhone, so keep reading this passage and get started implementing one of them according to your needs.

How to Retrieve Old Voice Memos from iPhone

4 ways to retrieve old voice memos on iPhone step-by-step

Normally, when you find voice memos are lost, you can directly open the Recently Deleted folder to search for and recover the desired voice memos. But it's worth noting that the Recently Deleted folder can only restore files deleted within 30 days. 

Of course, if you have previously backed up your recording files, you can also restore lost or deleted voice memos from the backup. If you don't have any backups, third-party iPhone data recovery software will be your best choice. Now let's take a look at how to recover deleted voice memos on iPhone.

Way 1. Recover voice memos from Recently Deleted folder

The first way is to check if the deleted voice memos are still in your iPhone's Recently Deleted folder. When you delete a voice memo from your iPhone, by default it stays in the Recently Deleted folder for 30 days. After that, it is permanently deleted. 

If you are trying to recover voice memos from this period, the next steps will walk you through how to retrieve deleted voice memos from iPhone.

Step 1. Go to the Voice Memos app on your iPhone.

Step 2. Click the Recently Deleted folder to select the deleted voice memos you want to recover.

Step 3. Tap the wanted voice memo and click Edit in the top right corner. Then tap Recover X Recordings.

Recover from Vioce Memos Recently Deleted

Way 2. Retrieve old voice memos on iPhone without backups

If method 1 doesn't work, or you don't have any voice memo files, how to recover deleted voice memos on iPhone without backup? You can only seek help from the third-party iPhone data recovery software AOMEI Data Recovery for iOS. It can deeply scan your iPhone and help you recover deleted or lost voice memos quickly.

With the help of this software, you can recover not only old voice memos, but also deleted contacts, call history, notes, photos, videos, WeChat history and more data with a high success rate. 

What's more, unlike recovering from iTunes or iCloud backup, it won't delete any existing data on your iPhone. Meanwhile, you can preview and selectively recover the data on your iOS devices. It is widely compatible with multiple iOS devices, like iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch with iOS 10 and later.

Learn about the steps on how to recover trimmed voice memos on iPhone without backup below.

Step 1. First, download and install this tool on your computer. 

Step 2. Open this tool and connect your iPhone to the computer via a charging cable.

Connect iOS Device

Step 2. Click Trust This Computer on your iPhone and click Scan Now in the home interface.

Click Scan Now

Step 3. After that, tap Voice Memos to select the voice memos you want to retrieve, and then click Recover.

Recover Photos

Way 3. Restore lost voice memos from iCloud Backup

Many iPhone users tend to make regular iCloud backups. If you have an iCloud backup available, then it is crucial to recover lost voice memos from your iPhone.

If you enable iCloud syncing of your voice memos by default, they will be retained in iCloud. This means that your iCloud backup will not contain your voice memos. Therefore, turn off your iCloud before restoring data from your iCloud backup. As shown in the picture below.

Enable Voice Memos

Notes:✎...
Make sure your old voice memos are in the iCloud backup you selected.
When restoring data from iCloud backup, it will erase all iPhone data first, so please make a backup of your existing data first.

Let's begin to follow the steps on how to recover voice memos from iCloud.

Step 1. On your iPhone, click Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings.

Erase All Content and Settings

Step 2. Then you can start to set up your iPhone. When you come to the Apps & Data screen, click the Restore from iCloud Backup option.

Step 3. Choose a backup that saves the old voice memos after signing into iCloud with your Apple ID and password.

Restore from iCloud Backup

Way 4. Recover old Voice Memos with iTunes Backup

Similarly, if you use iTunes to backup your voice memos to your computer in advance, you can easily retrieve the voice memos on iPhone from the iTunes backup.

It is necessary to note that it is the same as iCloud, the original data of your iPhone will be overwritten. And you can't preview and select the voice memos you want to recover. Let's figure out how to find old voice memos on iPhone.

Step 1. Run the latest version of iTunes and connect your iPhone to the computer. Click the device icon.

Click the Device Icon

Step 2. Select Summary in the left column menu and click Restore Backup under the Backups menu.

Resote Backup

Step 3. Select a backup containing the lost voice memo, then click Restore.

Click Restore

When the restore process is finished, you can reopen the Voice Memos app on your iPhone to see if the old voice memos has been retrieved.

Bonus tip: A better way to protect voice memos from loss

To prevent data loss, you have no choice but to back up your data in advance. However, as mentioned earlier, when you choose to restore from iTunes or iCloud Backup, all existing data on your iPhone will be overwritten. So you run the risk of losing new data again. If you want to find a better solution, here is a free backup tool FoneTool that can help you back up your data safely without wiping your iPhone.

Besides the features of a user-friendly interface, fast backup speed and high success rate, it also allows you to freely select the data for backup, thus saving your storage space and time. It is also perfectly compatible with various iOS devices and Windows PC. Please start making full use of this powerful iOS data backup software.

Steps on how to backup iPhone without losing data

Step 1. You can click the download button to get FoneTool for free. Then connect your iPhone to your PC via a USB cable.

Download Freeware Win 11/10/8.1/8/7/XP
Secure Download

Step 2. If you want to make a partial backup, you can click Phone Backup > Selective Backup > Get Started. If you want to create a full backup, you can select Full Backup.

FoneTool Selective Backup

Step 2. Here we choose backup photos as an example. Click Photos to select the needed to backup and click OK.

Select Photos

Step 3. After choosing a storage path to save the backup and then click Start Backup.

Start Backup

If you want to check the backup files, you can go to Backup History.

Restore from Messages Backup

Conclusion

If you are bothered about how to retrieve old voice memos from iPhone. Believe you can get help in this guide. No matter which reason causes your voice memos to be lost, you can find a method that works for you and find audio messages on iPhone.

Besides recovering recording files from recently deleted folders, iTunes or iCloud backups, we provide a more comprehensive iPhone data recovery software called AOMEI Data Recovery for iOS to help you perform iPhone data recovery in voice memos without backups.

In addition, to better resist the risk of data loss, a free and professional backup tool FoneTool is available for you to choose from. This well-designed tool will ensure that no data is lost from your iPhone. Come and explore more of its helpful features.

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