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Forum Discussion
I deleted photos from my desktop app and they also got deleted from the web. Can I recover them?
Hello, I think I have made a huge mistake. My knowledge of computers is limited. Is there anything I can do?
Sometimes I use software on my computer that take a lot of memory. So I deleted a lot of data in order to make space. I thought I could delete files and photos from my computer and they still would be on dropbox. I understand now I was wrong. I did not look at these files and photos for a long time so I can not say exactly when it was all deleted but probably some time last year. I have had dropbox for many year. Is there anything I can do? I have a Plus account. Grateful for any help
no but i will try in the future. reading up on it now. thanks
what i don't understand though is why can't i clear them off my computer to free up space. why did they delete in the cloud
- Walter
Dropbox Staff
If you're using the Dropbox desktop app to do this, you can use selective sync to free up some hard drive space on your computer without deleting your files seanjohnny
Have you tried that instead of deleting your files from within your Dropbox folder?
yes that worked with the events page. thanks so much. i thought i was going to be sick. you are a life saver
I dont remeber, possibly on may-june? I have looked through events and they go back to 14th of august. There I can not find that I deleted the pictures
- Walter
No worries seanjohnny - let us know if anything else comes up!
- Jay
Hi Ylva lost info, if you're not seeing the missing files on the deleted files page, then there's a few possibilities as to why this might be the case:
- The files are on another Dropbox account
- They were on a shared folder you don't have access to any more
- The files were deleted outside of the 30 day period
- The files were permanently deleted
It does sound like your files were on your account, however, they were deleted well outside the 30 day recovery period for Plus plans.
We're sorry we can't be more helpful on this matter.
I have done the same thing. I was clearing space from my computer. Is there a way to get it back. It was done less than 30 minutes ago
- Megan
Hey Ylva lost info, sorry to hear about that!
Did you delete files directly from your local Dropbox folder, or were they removed from a different location on your device?
I'm asking because if the files were deleted outside of your Dropbox folder, it wouldn't affect the content synced through Dropbox.
However, if you deleted them from within the Dropbox folder, that would also remove them from your account online.
If this happened last year, unfortunately there's not much that we can do since, as we're unable to restore content that was deleted that long ago. I'm really sorry about that.
Keep me posted!
oh no. thank you for your answer but I had everyting in my dropbox folder on my computer. I guess nothing to do then.
- Nancy
I don’t believe there’s much to be done either, Ylva lost info. However, do you remember approximately which month these files were deleted in last year?
