How to Recover Deleted Facebook Posts

Brad Stephenson is a freelance tech and geek culture writer with 12+ years' experience. He writes about Windows 10, Xbox One, and cryptocurrency.

What to Know

• In the app, open your profile and go to Activity log >Activity history >Trash. Tap Restore on the post.
• If posts are gone because you deleted your Facebook account, log in within 30 days and select Cancel Deletion.
• Some other techniques include checking your email and notification history for old records of the post.

This article explains some strategies for recovering deleted Facebook posts.

Use Facebook's Activity Log Feature

When you use the Facebook app's Activity Log to delete a post, you can retrieve it for up to 30 days. This won't work if you delete a post directly from your Home feed, however. These steps explain how this works in the app:

1. Open your Facebook profile and tap the three-dot menu under your photo.

Select Activity log >Activity history.

Select Restore to confirm. The post has been restored to your timeline.

If you're switching to a new device, Facebook posts, media, or messages will automatically be available once you log in to Facebook on your new device.

Cancel Your Facebook Account Deletion

If you delete your entire Facebook account, you've also deleted all your posts and media. If you change your mind and want to salvage your content, you can easily undo the deletion process.

To get your account (and posts) back, log in to Facebook via the mobile app or a web browser within 30 days of initiation, and then select Cancel Deletion.

You account is no longer recoverable if it's been longer than 30 days.

Strategies for Finding Deleted Facebook Posts

If your deleted posts are gone and unrecoverable via the method outlined above, here are some workarounds you can try:

Find the original post

If you've shared a post that you found funny or interesting but later deleted it, don't worry. You can try locating the original content by using Facebook's search feature or conducting a Google search. Simply input keywords from the post's text or the title of the webpage linked in the original post to track it down.

Check your emails

If you've set up Facebook push notifications for specific posts, there's a chance you might find the post you're searching for in an email in your inbox. Run a search in your email account using keywords from the post's text. If you can't recall any specific text, search for the word "Facebook" to find relevant emails.

If you're on Android and have set up notification history, search through past app notifications. The Facebook post might still live there.

Check your friends' emails

Your Facebook friends might have turned on email notifications and therefore received alerts referencing your post, especially if they're mentioned or tagged. Ask your friends to search their inbox for the deleted post you're looking for.

How to Find Deleted Facebook Messages

Conversations and individual messages you delete in Messenger are gone forever. However, you may have really just archived the messages, making them much easier to recover.

Also, while you may have deleted your side of the conversation, it could still exist for the participants. Ask them to search for the message and send you a copy via a screenshot or copy-and-paste.

If you're trying to find a specific old post, try searching for a keyword or phrase you remember from the post. In the search field, type the unique search term and select Posts under Filters.

Go to your saved Facebook posts section. Or, select Menu > Saved. You'll see all the posts, videos, and photos you saved for later.

To schedule posts on Facebook for a Group, open the Group and go to Write something or Discussion, then Schedule > Save. For a Page, select the profile image and go to Meta Business Suite > Planner > Schedule > Schedule post > Save. You can not schedule posts from a personal account.

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