How To Recover iPhone Contacts, SMS & Notes from iTunes Backup?

by Ben Johnson

Just incase if you have accidentally lost your iPhone contacts, photos, SMS or notes due to any reason and “Restore from Backup…” option in iTunes is also not working, you can still access and restore your iPhone’s data as long as you have backup files saved on your hard drive. iTunes always backup your iPhone before syncing it with your PC / Mac. You can use iPhone Backup Extractor and DiskAid to restore the content you need on your jailbroken iPhone.

*Find download links at the end of post!

  1. Download *iPhone Backup Extractor for Mac.
  2. Download *DiskAid for Windows and Mac.
  3. Create a new folder on your desktop. I just named it “Jaxov”.

    4. iPhone Data Recovery Requirements

  4. Double click on iPhone Backup Extractor to launch it and click on “Read Backups” button to automatically access the stored backups on your hard drive.

    5. iPhone Backup Extractor

  5. Select your device and click on “Choose” button.

    6. Choose iDevice

  6. iPhone Backup Extractor will show you the contents of selected backup. Choose “iOS Files” and click on the “Extract” button.

    7. iPhone Backup Contents

  7. iPhone Backup Extractor will prompt you to select the folder where it will extract the backup files. Choose the folder you created in step 3.

    8. Choose Extract Folder

  8. Full backup extraction will take 3 to 4 seconds.

    9. Extracting Backup

  9. Once done! Open the folder your desktop and navigate to iOS Files->Library. Here you will find all important data you need to restore including notes, SMS and address book which will contain your iPhone contacts.

    10. iPhone Backup Library

  10. Now open DiskAid and navigate to Root->User->Library. Here you will find same folders which you extracted in the previous step.

    11. DiskAid iPhone Backup

  11. Thats it! Just replace the AddressBook folder you found in step 9 with the one you found in step 10 using DiskAid. This will restore all of your contacts. Simply replace the other folders to restore the respective content.

Download DiskAid for Windows and Mac
Download iPhone Backup Extractor for Mac

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15 comments

  • MARKWILLIAMS •

    If you backup with iTunes and you restored from the backup and the notes were gone, then there is no where to retrieve them from unless you have another backup that contains those notes.Launch iTunes on the computer and go to iTunes>Preferences>Devices. You will see a window with all of your backups listed in it.If you see a recent backup that you are certain contains the notes that you need, then you can restore notes to iPhone from backup.

    Reply →
  • Jackie •

    DId all up to step 10. For some reason I cannot find a Folders tab in Diskaid, and nothing for “root”. Also the window looks different than the example. Where can I find the address book to restore to???

    Reply →
    • Benjabi •

      Same here. No Root folder and no way to recover call history or text messages back to my iPhone. This was a waste of 25 bucks.

      Reply →
  • Kevin •

    Why not Total Saver from myphonedata.com ?
    I’ve used it and it works like charm.
    Also, it costs a mere $5.99 and it does it all – contacts, texts, notes, pictures, videos
    iphonebackupextractor costs a whopping $30!!!!

    Reply →
    • Sherin •

      Agreed. I have used the Photo Saver app from myphonedata.com and it worked pretty well.
      For $2.49 it is a pretty good piece of software

      Reply →
    • KNguyen •

      Thanks dude. I bought total saver for $6 and it recovered everything else. Other apps which I looked around for to recover data from my iphone backup cost atleast 20$ or more. They also have free trial version at http://www.myphonedata.com/trial.php

      Reply →
  • Nvn •

    thx. you just saved my life

    Reply →
  • JEFF •

    THANKYOU SO MUCH!!!!

    Reply →
  • sunnie •

    I followed your instructions, but still don’t see photos from the extracted material. You reference the address book, but what about finding photos- would they be under ios and library? thanks

    Reply →
  • hineko •

    Must i jailbreak my phone in order to use Diskaid? is there any other ways to use do step 10 using another software?

    Reply →
    • Wolverine •

      A jailbroken iPhone with “afc2add” installed through Cydia is a must!

      Reply →
  • Spamsalad •

    Is there a PC version of the extractor?

    Reply →
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