How to Recover Formatted SD Cards

You formatted your SD card full of photos and videos with no backups available. It could happen to any of us. Do not despair yet. Accidentally deleted files are not actually gone forever. There are always something we can do to recover our photos.

The delete or format command on most cameras just marks the space on a memory card as being available for future use, rather than overwriting the actual space on the card. As long as you don’t record anything new onto the card, previously deleted photos should be relatively easy to recover using file recovery software. If you’ve accidentally formatted your camera SD card, here what you need to do to recover your files.

Step 1: Don’t do anything to your memory card once you realize photos have been deleted. Do not take new pictures or videos. New files will take any space available on your SD card, and may overwrite the old deleted files. If the files are overwritten, they cannot be recovered.

Step 2: Prepare the tools needed. You’ll need a card reader, a computer, and some patience.

Step 3: Select a data recovery software. We recommend H Data Recovery Software. This fully featured recovery software can easily and safely recover deleted photos from computers, camera SD cards and many other storage devices.

Step 4: Install and launch H Data Recovery Software.

Step 5: Plug your card reader into your computer. Select the Flash Memory Recovery module by clicking it. H Data will detect all the flash memory cards currently connected to this computer. Choose your camera SD card and click Next.

Step 6: H Data Recovery will scan the SD card file structure and try to find and reconstitute the deleted files. When the scan is complete, you will be able to see the list of all recoverable files. If you act quick enough after the format, the chance of a complete recovery is very high. Look for your lost photos in respective folders such as the DCIM folder.

Step 7: Select all the images you want to restore, and click the “Next” button. Choose a place you want to restore the files to. It’s best not to save them back to the memory card to avoid overwriting.

If you format your SD card in order to fix the problems like unreadable SD cards, you can also use above steps to recover your photos or videos.