So you just learned that photo recovery software may be able to recover your deleted or lost pictures? Whether you accidentally deleted these photos from camera memory card, or they became inaccessible because the card or hard drive had corrupted. Worse yet, you don’t have a backup.
- There are several free photo recovery programs. Many are available from the makers of the best data recovery software on the market, which can recover other types of files besides photos. This is because image files, like JPG and PNG, are common and among the easiest files to recover.
- MiniTool Mac Photo Recovery, a professional & reliable photo recovery program for Mac, is designed to recover various kinds of photos, audios and videos from digital cameras, memory cards, USB drives, hard drives, etc. For home users.
Best Data Recovery Software For PC, Mac 1. Recuva is created by the software developers Piriform, who are also responsible for the popular CCleaner PC cleaning tool. Just like other products, you should also expect attractive interface with high quality.
Anyway, you now need to retrieve your lost “digital memories”, desperately. I felt you. This year 2019 alone, I’ve had two friends coming to me because some pictures got accidentally erased from their digital camera. Fortunately, I used Recuva and the program helped restore some of the photos.
Not all digital photo recovery software is created equal. In our experience, some are good at recovering deleted pictures, some are good at rescuing more images from a crashed storage media. Some took less time to scan the drive, while others can take you hours to finish a scan.
We tested 20+ dedicated photo recovery software on our PC and Mac (yes, you need a computer to run those programs), and handpicked a list of the best ones that stand out.
Read on to find out.
Please note: the software selected below are mainly designed for recovering photos, videos from digital cameras, memory cards, etc. You may also want to read our best data recovery software review for Windows and Mac. If you want to recover photos from a mobile device, check out our recovery software reviews for iPhones, iPads, or Android devices.
Quick Summary
Don’t have time to read this entire review? No problem! Below is a recap of our recommendations for the best photo recovery software.
Best FREE Photo Recovery Software:
- PhotoRec (Windows/Mac)
- Exif Untrasher (Mac Only)
- Recuva (Windows Only)
Best Paid Photo Recovery Software:
- Stellar Photo Recovery ($39.99, Windows/Mac)
- Remo Media Recover ($49.95, Windows/Mac)
- CardRecovery Pro ($49.96, Windows Only)
- Picture Rescue ($49, Windows/Mac)
- RecoverIt Photo Recovery ($49.95, Windows/Mac)
Other Photo Recovery Software Worth Trying:
- Easy Digital Photo Recovery ($59, Windows Only)
- Recover My Photos ($39.95, Windows Only)
- Disk Doctors Photo Recovery ($49.97+, Windows Only)
Below, you’ll find our impartial reviews. You can also click the links above to get the image recovery software that fits you best and start recovering your lost pictures right away.
Best Photo Recovery Software: What to Consider?
We analyze from five different criteria, i.e. security, recovery ability, supported devices, ease of use, and system compatibility. We’ll also include detailed explanations on why they are important.
Security
All recommended software and apps on our site are virus-free, we do so by uploading downloadable files to Valkyrie — a sophisticated file verdict system built by Comodo to detect whether a program contains malware. We also evaluate whether the program is nondestructive, as software designed for photo recovery should perform read-only operations and shouldn’t cause any damage to the original storage media.
Recovery Capability
A powerful photo recovery software should be able to recover as many kinds of image formats as possible. Besides standard JPEG, PNG, we also see if the program supports camera RAW formats. Also somewhat surprisingly, most photo retrieval software available in the market claim they support recovering video and audio files as well.
Supported Devices
If a photo recovery software is unable to detect the storage devices e.g. SD card, hard drive, etc. where your lost photos used to be saved, then the software is useless. We did find several programs that are designed for restoring pictures from a PC hard drive only (NOT external media). In short, the best photo recovery software should support popular media storage devices.
Ease of Use
Software UI/UX is another important factor we consider. Some programs are poorly designed and even look alike, we knock them out because they are probably white-labeled products (except the brand name, everything else in the program looks extremely similar or exactly identical). Also, we have to admit that we prefer GUI software than command line tools. But we do include PhotoRec on our list because it’s free.
OS Compatibility
If a Windows photo recovery software is not compatible with the latest Windows 10, or a Mac photo recovery app can’t be run under macOS Mojave or Catalina, we have to think twice before including it on our recommended list.
The Best Photo Recovery Software in 2019: Our Picks
Note that all the software below have been tested by our team and we confirm that they are safe to download and use, some are free some require to pay (we’ll make it clear), some programs can only be run on Windows or macOS, while some support both. Software won’t succeed in every case, your luck may vary 🙂
1. PhotoRec (Windows/Mac/Linux)
Don’t be fooled by its name, PhotoRec not only retrieves photos and media files, but it also can recover numerous file formats including ZIP, Office, PDF, HTML and many more (full tech specific is here). It’s free to download and use on Windows, macOS, and Linux. However, the learning curve for handling the program might hold many people away as it’s a command line tool (above is its main interface). So, the photo recovery program is best for computer people who are comfortable running on DOS environment. However, if you are willing to spend a bit of time following this official tutorial, chances are you will learn how to use it and maybe recover your lost pictures.
2. Stellar Photo Recovery (Windows/Mac)
Boasted it as one of the oldest data recovery service providers (since 1993), Stellar Phoenix, now simply called Stellar, provides a photo recovery software that’s capable of recovering images, videos, and audio files. It supports both general image file formats as well as camera raws. Best of all, the preview ability of Stellar Photo Recovery makes the program stand out, as it even allows you to preview audio sounds before they are recovered — which is a huge time saver. Stellar Photo Recovery comes with both Windows and Macintosh version, so you can run the software on a PC or Mac.
3. Recuva (Windows Only)
Recuva is a free undelete program developed by Piriform, later acquired by Avast back in 2017. The small utility got its word of mouth as it’s super simple to use thanks to the step-by-step guide as shown on the main interface. Plus, it’s free! Note though, the new maker added a new pricing structure which tries to persuade you to pay but frankly the value of the Pro versions are limited and we don’t recommend you purchase them unless you really need premium support. Currently, Recuva is for Windows only. Those claim Recuva for Mac is false and misleading.
4. Remo Media Recover (Windows/Mac)
Like its name indicates this photo recovery software is specifically designed to recover media items. Remo claims it’s able to identify and restore up to 50 popular media file types from memory cards, iPods, hard drives and SSDs. It can restore RAW images from almost all popular DSLRs & camcorder brands. Their official site offers a lot of useful step-by-step tutorials and troubleshooting guides. If you come across any technical issues during your photo recovery process, those resources are worth taking a look.
5. Exif Untrasher (Mac Only)
There are many free data recovery software out there, few are for Mac users. Exif Untrasher is one of the few apps out there. Developed by a German software engineer who accidentally formatted his camera’s memory card and deleted images erroneously, and he was using a Mac machine! The utility is able to scan your memory card or external drive for photos in JPEG format and try to recover them. Note: after you install the app on your Mac. The correct way to open and run it is: go to Finder > Applications, locate Exif Untrasher app, right click and select “Open”.
6. CardRecoveryPro (Windows Only)
CardRecoveryPro, originally designed to retrieve memory cards for lost photos, now also supports recovery of lost photos from a computer’s hard disk drive or solid-state drive. Once you install the program on your computer, click “Start Scan”, select which drive you want to recover the files from, define your camera brand, and confirm the destination folder you’d like to save the found files, then the program is good to go. Note: the program is NOT for Mac users.
7. Picture Rescue (Mac/Windows)
Made by Prosoft Engineering (a prestigious data software company based in California), Picture Rescue 2 is another powerful photo recovery software that can be used on either a PC or Mac. This program is specifically made to recover media files from external storage devices like digital camera media cards and flash disks, which means you can NOT use it to recover lost photos from your computer hard drive. When inserting your SD card, open Picture Rescue, the name of your SD card will pop up on the main interface of the software. Getting started, you just need to select the location you want to recover and click the “Scan” button.
8. RecoverIt Photo Recovery (Windows/Mac)
If you need to recover photos from several different types of devices, check out RecoverIt Photo Recovery — a well-developed program that may get your photos back from accidental deletion, system crash or the other photo loss situations. Just install the software on your PC or Mac and open it, select the location you want to recover files from. Then click the “Recover” button, RecoverIt will show you the scanning time it needs to complete. While it’s very intuitive, we did find one issue with the program: it’s very resource-huggy while scanning for a drive, the fan of our PC ran out loud and the computer heated up very quickly.
9. Easy Digital Photo Recovery (Windows Only)
Easy Digital Photo Recovery is a simple image recovery tool that works amazingly well to recover many types of graphic images (from JPEG, TIFF to many RAW formats). What we like most about the software is that it scans quickly and allows you to preview all found images making it a lot easier to locate your wanted files. The program incorporates multiple languages on the Interface including English, French, Spanish, German, etc. Though the developer’s website has yet to update compatibility information about Windows 10, we tested it on our Windows 10 based PC and it worked perfectly well.
10. Recover My Photos (Windows Only)
If you want to use this simple-to-use photo recovery software, you have to check your Windows version because there are two different Windows version for you to download – Windows 32-bit and Windows 64 bit. The terms 32-bit and 64-bit refer to the way a computer’s processor handles information. The 64-bit version of Windows handles large amounts of random access memory (RAM) more effectively than a 32-bit system. Tips: If you can’t confirm the right version of your Windows, download the 32-bit system because Recover My Photos 32-bit version will still work for the Windows 64-bit though you may lose some processing efficiency. In a word, Recover My Photos is still one of the best recovery software in the market. You may get all your lost photos back than you expected.
>> Get Recover My Photos ($39.95) <<
11. Disk Doctors Photo Recovery (Windows/Mac)
If you have tried all the above photo recovery software and you still can not get your photos back, Disk Doctors Photo Recovery may be your last chance. This software might be more friendly to earlier Windows versions e.g. Windows XP or Windows 7, but by no means Windows 10. When we installed the program on our PC (with the latest Windows 10), we found the instruction texts as shown on its interface are too small to read. However, the software still worked to scan after some simple settings and it did find some photos afterwards.
>> Get Disk Doctors Photo Recovery (Windows $49.97, Mac $69.97) <<
12. Odboso Photo Retrieval (Windows Only)
PhotoRetrieval is another photo recovery software worth trying. It’s developed to recover deleted photos (and videos & audio) from both computer hard drives and portable storage devices. No matter you lose files due to accidental deletion, disk re-formatting, hardware malfunction, Odboso claims it has no problem handling these situations. Supported media file formats include: common picture (JPG/JPEG, PNG, TIFF), camera RAW image (Canon CR2/CRW, Nikon NEF, Fuji RAF, Pentax PEF, Olympus ORF), and multimedia (3GP, AVI, M4V, MOV, MP4).
Influenced by the startup culture in the Silicon Valley, Jessica loves building things from zero to one and is keen on following news related to the Big Five tech giants and many SaaS startups.
As Macs continue to gain market share, there is an increased likelihood that you will have to support them if you are a tech. And even if you aren’t a tech, it’s good to know which tools are the best to use when it comes time to repair your own. I have put together a list of what are, in my opinion, the ten best repair tools for troubleshooting, diagnosing, and repairing a Mac. Many of them are free or offer a free trial.
OSx Sierra
Disk Warrior Trial
Free Mac Disk Repair Software
TechTool Protogo
TechTool Protogo is a Mac repair program suite which contains three of Micromat’s best Mac repair tools; TechTool Pro 8, TechTool Pro Classic, and DiskStudio. Protogo creates a bootable Mac repair toolbox with these tools as well as any of your own tools on a portable hard drive or flash drive. You can then boot from this drive, bypassing the OS, and run diagnostics on a computer to determine problems. Protogo also allows you to repair and recover data from problematic hard drives as well as defragment, optimize, and securely delete data.
Cost: $129.99
Memtest OS X
Free Recovery Software Mac
Memtest OS X is a memory testing program for Mac OS X. It is a command line utility so it can be ran in OS X or in Single-User Mode if your Mac will not boot. It is great for testing intermittent system problems when you are having trouble determining if it is a memory problem. If you prefer memtest with a GUI front-end, then be sure to check out Rember. Rember will run in OS X but will not work in Single-User Mode so Memtest OS X is the better option.
Cost: $1.39
Mac Disk Repair – DiskWarrior 4
Disk Repair for Macs – DiskWarrior utilizes a unique disk repair method for Macs
DiskWarrior is arguably one of the best hard drive repair programs for the Mac. It works differently than other data repair programs. Instead of trying to rebuild the damaged data itself, DiskWarrior builds replacement data based off of the original data. It then verifies the new data structure based on the original to make sure it is error free. You can also use DiskWarrior as a preventative maintenance utility for hard disks. When run, it rebuilds your directory eliminating any damage that you may not be aware of. It also optimizes the directory for better performance.
Cost: $99.95
If it is more serious and your Mac’s hard drive has crashed, I have provided an extensive data recovery guide with a list of Hard Drive Recovery Tools in my article How to Recover Data from a Crashed Hard Drive.
OnyX
Onyx is a maintenance, optimization, and personalization utility for Mac OS X. It allows you to run hard drive diagnostics, run system maintenance tasks, delete caches, and configure tons of OS X hidden features. Even if you aren’t using it as a repair utility, it is a great application to help keep your Mac running in top shape.
Best Free Memory Card Recovery Software For Mac
Cost: Free!
Mac Data Rescue
Data Rescue is a data recovery program that focuses purely on recovering data from corrupt drives instead of hard drive repair. It scans the corrupt drive analyzing all of its contents and allows you to choose which data you would like to recover. It even scans for deleted files. Data Rescue II restores the data to a separate drive leaving the original data intact. It comes with an emergency boot CD that you can use to recover data when the computer will not boot and it also works on drives that won’t mount.
Cost: $99.00
AppCleaner
AppCleaner may not be classified as a repair tool but it can be used as one. When you are having trouble with an application in OS X, you can simply remove it by dragging it to the Trash. However, this still leaves behind the applications preferences, caches, and other files that could still cause the same problem after you reinstall it. AppCleaner will remove all of these files making sure that the app is completely gone before you attempt a reinstall.
Cost: Free!
Drive Genius
Drive Genius is a disk utility application for Macs. Its main features include defragmenting, running benchtests, directory repair, integrity checks, surface scans, repartitioning, cloning, shredding data, and more. This is actually the same program used to defrag Macs at the Genius Bar in Apple Stores. Drive Genius also comes on a bootable DVD so you can run it even when a Mac will not boot.
Cost: $99.00
Mac Backup – Carbon Copy Cloner
Carbon Copy Cloner is a simple yet very effective backup utility for the Mac. Like most other backup utilities, it can be scheduled to backup your Mac on a regular basis. The best part, however, is its ability to completely clone a hard drive with it still being bootable. This tool comes in very handy when you are replacing hard drives, setting up multiple Macs, or recovering from a system crash. Carbon Copy Cloner is donation-ware so you can download it for free without any restrictions. You can also check out SuperDuper which has more features but costs $27.95. However, if you just need a simple backup and cloning utility, Carbon Copy Cloner does a great job.
Cost: Free! (donation-ware)
Apple Mac Disk Repair – AppleJack
AppleJack is a troubleshooting utility for Mac OS X. It runs under Single-User Mode so it can be used even when OS X will not boot. AppleJack will repair disks, repair permissions, cleanup cache files, validate preference files, and remove swap files. You can select these tasks individually or have AppleJack run all of them and even reboot when finished. Unfortunately, at the time of writing this article, AppleJack is not yet compatible with Leopard but a new version is in the works. Be sure to check their page frequently for an update because this is an invaluable tool.
Cost: Free! (open-source)
Hardware Monitor
Hardware Monitor is a utility that allows you to view data from the hardware sensors in a Mac. It currently has support for temperature readings, battery data, voltage, current, fan speed, power and load, ambient light, as well as user-defined artificial sensors. It’s a great utility to use when simply trying to find out if your hardware is malfunctioning.
Cost: € 7.00 (can also be purchased with U.S. Dollars)
OSX disk repair -Leopard
This is kind of a nice segway into handy hardware tools and toolkits. Click on the following link if you want to see some great ideas on what I recommend for your Mac or PC Repair Toolkit.
As you may know, I believe your should support Macs in your Computer IT Consultant Business. I state my case here in my article on Why You Should Support Macs With Your IT Business.
Well if you were counting, that is 4 totally free Mac OSX disk repair utilities, and one so cheap it may as well be free! The best Mac repair disk software may well be a paid one depending on your exact needs, and I’ve shown you my pick for the best of those too.
Excellent Mac disk repair software is provided above, for you to consider and try if you like. What Mac OS X repair tools do you like? Is there another Mac Disk Repair utility you’d suggest? Please leave a comment to help others, or if the above tools have helped you. And as for hardware, click this link if you want to repair hard drive-Mac.
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