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Unable to restore deleted files from C:OneDrive

Lee Bourgoin 0 Reputation points
2025-10-07T12:05:37.3366667+00:00

Good Morning everyone,

I hope you are well, hope someone can help me.
I am pretty computer illiterate so pardon the lingo.

Last night I attempted to free up space on my C: drive. I saw that the OneDrive folder contained 47gb and I mistakenly deleted it. It seems that it has permanently deleted everything.
The issue is I did not realize that 90% of my desktop folders were synced to OneDrive and now I have lost all my work documents and personal documents as well.

I have tried the fixes that I could find online, log in to my OneDrive web account and restore them from the recycle bin, but the issue is they are not there.
I also tried to restore to a previous date prior to me deleting the folder.
Also did not work.

I tried to run a system restore through windows, but unfortunately I didn't have system protection turned on for my C: drive.

I really hope someone has a solution for this :S

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Recovery and backup
Answer recommended by moderator
  1. DaveM121 861.4K Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2025-10-07T12:41:54.6133333+00:00

    If you have deleted the OneDrive folder, that folder will have contained your Desktop, Documents and Pictures folders by default, and deleting that folder will have bypassed the Recycle Bin and directly deleted that data.

    There is no undo option and a System Restore does not restore users files, it only restores System files and the registry.

    Log into OneDrive in a web browser (https://onedrive.live.com/) to check if your files are still avaialble there.

    And also check the Recycle Bin on OneDrive online.

    If your files are not avaialble on OneDrive online for download, sadly there is no native method avaialble to recover your files, you could try some 3rd party recovery utility, but honestly, that is a lot of data that was deleted, and file recovery is very hit and miss, it is unlikely you will be able to recover all that data.

    1 person found this answer helpful.

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