An accidental scroll, a system crash, and a child playing with your phone have one thing in common. They could accidentally delete some of your data. When you lose data, you might go to the recycle bin and retrieve it. However, most Android phones that use Google Messages as the default texting app don’t have a recycle bin.
Once you delete a message, you don’t get the 30-day grace period days that Samsung Messages offers. If you’ve lost important text messages, we offer solutions to help you recover them on the best Samsung phones and tablets.
Understanding how your smartphone stores and erases data
Data remains on your device even after you’ve tapped the delete button. Secure Data Recovery explains that when you erase content on your phone, it doesn’t disappear for good. Instead, your phone labels that space as available to allow new information to overwrite it.
Your deleted data still exists on the phone’s drive, and there’s a chance of retrieving it. But there’s a catch. You must stop using your phone to send new messages, take more photos, and perform other actions. Any new content replaces the deleted files. At this point, you won’t be able to recover your messages.
Digging up your deleted messages should be a walk in the park once you have a backup version with Samsung Cloud or Google Drive. But not everyone’s that careful with their data. Without a backup version to restore, you need to download recovery software on your PC. The software scans your smartphone for deleted messages once you connect both devices with a USB cable.
But there are dangers when using third-party solutions. Most require you to root your device, which leaves it vulnerable to malware attacks, among other risks. Instead, we show you how to retrieve your messages using backup solutions like Samsung Switch, Samsung Cloud, and Google Drive.
The device used for this walkthrough is a Samsung Galaxy A23 running Android 13 and the One UI 5.1 launcher. The procedures may look different on older and new versions of Android.
Restore text messages through Samsung Cloud
Samsung Cloud is a storage feature in the Settings menu. It allows you to save files to the cloud and download them later. If you backed up your messages before you lost them using Samsung Cloud, recover them with the following steps.
- Scroll down with two fingers from the top of your homescreen. This action opens the notification panel.
- Tap the Settings icon.
- In the Settings menu, scroll up and tap Accounts and backup.
- Select Restore data to see your last backup history.
- Tap the backup history.
- Uncheck all data, except Messages, unless you want to restore multiple files.
- Tap Restore and wait for the messages to finish restoring.
Contact your mobile carrier for records of the lost SMS texts
Depending on your mobile carrier, you might be able to retrieve your texts through your service provider. For example, if you use T-Mobile, Verizon, or AT&T, those companies keep records of the date, time, and people you exchanged texts with over a limited period. However, that doesn’t guarantee you’ll get the actual text message content as carriers like Sprint and T-mobile do not keep it. Since the period they save messages is limited, you won’t be able to restore every message you sent.
You’ll need a court order and a means of identification before your carrier company can release the information to you. Even though you own the device, the mobile carrier follows privacy policies to protect user data. They are obligated to protect the other party’s privacy in the text.
Use Samsung Smart Switch
If you want those text messages back, use Samsung Smart Switch. The data transfer solution is an official Samsung app that backs up data on your old Samsung phone and moves it to a new one. If you have existing data backed up on Samsung Switch, you can use it to get back your messages.
You need to download and install the Samsung Smart Switch app on your new phone and PC before connecting them with a USB cable.
- Connect a USB cable to a free port on your computer. Then connect the cable to your Samsung smartphone.
- Launch Smart Switch on your PC.
- Click Restore. The software automatically finds backed-up data on the computer. If it doesn’t, click Manually select file to import the backup file from your computer.
- Click Restore.
- Wait for Smart Switch to finish recovering your data.
Use Samsung Messages Recycle bin
If you have Samsung Messages set as your default texting app, Samsung Messages has a recycle bin where all deleted messages are stored for 30 days. If you don’t retrieve your deleted messages within that window, they’re gone forever. The Samsung Messages Recycle bin is enabled by default, but you can disable it from the app’s Settings menu. When you do, all messages are permanently deleted without entering the bin.
- Open Samsung Messages.
- Tap the three-dot icon to expand an options list.
- Select Recycle bin.
- Long-press the deleted text to select it. Tap other ones to select them as well.
- Tap Restore. Your deleted messages reappear among your existing messages.
How to protect your messages from permanent deletion
Considering the steps you’ll go through to recover them, you should look into protective measures for your messages. Archiving and backing them up are great steps to start with.
Archive messages
Archiving is the best way to hide annoying chats you want to avoid without deleting them forever. Your messages remain in the Google Messages app, but you won’t see them anymore because they’re in a different folder. If Samsung Messages is your default app, you can’t archive texts because the app doesn’t have the feature.
- Open Google Messages.
- Find the message you want to hide and then long-press on it. You can archive multiple messages at once.
- Tap the Archive icon. Your messages move to the archive folder.
- To restore archived messages, tap the menu icon beside the search bar.
- Tap Archived to see your hidden messages.
- Long-press or select the messages you’d like to restore. Then tap the Unarchive icon. This displays them in the Messages folder.
Back up your messages
Data backups are one of the easiest device tasks to do. But we can hardly find the time for it, especially when dealing with large amounts of data. Preinstalled cloud solutions like Samsung Cloud and Google Drive exist to make your life easier. You can access them from the Settings menu.
Backups with Samsung Cloud and Google Drive require an internet connection, which attracts data charges. Use a strong Wi-Fi connection to make the process faster. With Samsung Switch, you don’t need it if you’re backing up data to your PC.
We got your messages back
There was a time when deleting messages meant losing them for good. With more data recovery tools on the market, the risk of permanent data loss is almost nonexistent. Even the best Samsung phones aren’t immune to data loss. Though the urge to depend on one-click solution software may tempt you, it’s important to back up your device. You won’t have to retrieve anything if you don’t lose it in the first place.
