Someone in the office deleted a folder from the shared drive, and it is not in their Recycle Bin. That is normal, and it catches a lot of people out. Files deleted from a network share or NAS (a Synology, QNAP or Windows file server, for example) do not go to the Recycle Bin on the computer that deleted them. Whether they can be brought back depends on how the NAS or server was set up, and on what happens to it in the next few hours. Here is what to check, in order, and what not to do while you check.
Why the Recycle Bin on your PC is empty
The Windows Recycle Bin only covers local drives. When you delete something from a mapped network drive or a share opened in File Explorer, Windows asks whether you want to delete it permanently, and if you click yes, the file is removed on the server. A Mac connected to the share behaves similarly. Any safety net has to be on the NAS or server itself.
Step 1: Stop anything that could overwrite the space
Before you start looking, reduce the amount of new data being written to the volume:
- Ask staff to avoid saving large files to that share for now.
- Pause scheduled jobs that write to it, such as camera uploads, sync tasks or large copy jobs.
- Check whether the NAS empties its recycle bin on a schedule, and pause that schedule.
- Do not run disk repair, volume check or “optimize” tasks.
Leave the NAS running normally otherwise. Unless the hardware is showing faults, there is no need to shut it down.
Step 2: Check the share’s own recycle bin
Most NAS systems can keep a recycle bin for each shared folder, but it is a setting that has to be turned on:
- Synology (DSM): if Recycle Bin is enabled for the shared folder, deleted files go into a folder called
#recycleinside that share. An administrator can browse it in File Station and restore files. - QNAP (QTS / QuTS hero): the Network Recycle Bin keeps deleted files in a folder called
@Recyclein each share, if it is enabled. - Windows file servers: there is no recycle bin for files deleted over the network, so go straight to the next step.
Recycle bin folders may be hidden from regular users, so check with an administrator account.
Step 3: Look for snapshots and Previous Versions
Snapshots are point-in-time records of a volume, and they are often the quickest way to undo a deletion:
- Synology: Snapshot Replication can take scheduled snapshots of shared folders on Btrfs volumes. You can browse a snapshot and copy the missing folder back.
- QNAP: Snapshot Manager can restore files from snapshots of a volume or LUN, if snapshots were scheduled.
- Windows Server: if Shadow Copies of Shared Folders is turned on, right-click the parent folder on a PC, choose Properties, then Previous Versions.
Synology and QNAP can also present snapshots through the Windows Previous Versions tab when that option is enabled. Restore to a new location first, so you do not overwrite anything that has changed since.
Step 4: Check backups and cloud copies
If there was no recycle bin or snapshot, look at what else might hold a copy:
- NAS backup tasks such as Synology Hyper Backup or QNAP Hybrid Backup Sync, which can keep several versions
- A USB drive or second NAS that receives regular backups
- Cloud services the share syncs with, which often have their own deleted-files area and version history
- Copies on individual computers, email attachments, or files saved locally by the person who last worked on them
Be careful with two-way sync. If a sync task mirrors deletions, the cloud copy may already be gone or about to be, so pause the task before restoring.
What not to do
- Do not pull the disks out and connect them to a Windows PC. NAS drives usually use Linux RAID with ext4 or Btrfs file systems, which Windows cannot read. Windows may offer to initialize them, which damages the array.
- Do not install recovery software on the NAS or point it at the live volume from a PC over the network. It cannot see deleted space that way, and installing it writes to the volume.
- Do not rebuild, reset or reinitialize the NAS to “start fresh” while you are still trying to get files back.
When it needs a lab
If there was no recycle bin, snapshot or backup, the deleted data may still be on the drives until new data overwrites it. Getting it back means imaging each drive, rebuilding the RAID from those copies, and then recovering the deleted files from the file system. That has to happen away from the live system. See our NAS data recovery and deleted file recovery pages for more, and if you want to make sure this does not happen again, see our managed backup page.
Lost files from a shared drive? Call us
If the files are not in a recycle bin, snapshot or backup, stop writing to the NAS and talk to us. An engineer will evaluate the system and give you a fixed quote, recovery starts only when you approve it, and we work from a copy of the drives, not the originals. Call Data Retrieval at (213) 986-4855 or book a data recovery online. We serve Los Angeles, the Inland Empire and Ventura County on-site, with mail-in service from anywhere in the US.