If you want to know how to recover deleted Instagram messages, you’re in the right place. Social media applications like Instagram have changed the way we send and receive messages. However, they also make it easy to lose messages by accident. While there are no built-in functions for retrieving messages that you’re already deleted, there are indirect methods that have been proven to work. Let’s take a look at the most effective roundabouts for retrieving deleted messages easily.
How to Recover Deleted Instagram Messages
Instagram is one of the more popular social media apps nowadays. The Direct Messages feature makes it easy to send messages, photos, videos, and other media types. But just as easily as you can send messages, you can just as easily delete messages you’ve sent to friends and loved ones. And the sad part is that it can all happen by accident.
Unfortunately, there’s no easy way to retrieve messages you’ve sent and deleted. That’s because Instagram doesn’t have a built-in mechanism for it. But that’s not to say that retrieving data you’ve deleted is impossible since other people have done it using alternative methods. That being said, we’ve taken the liberty to compile a few methods that have been proven to work in recovering deleted Instagram messages.
Here are the methods on how to recover deleted messages and how to do them step by step.
1. Recover Deleted Instagram Messages From the User You Sent Them To
Whenever you send a message to someone via Instagram, or through any other social media application for that matter, the message is displayed on both your device and the device of the person you sent it to. That being said, you can retrieve a copy of deleted messages by asking for a copy of it from the person you’ve sent the files and messages.
While this advice may seem to be a no-brainer, it’s the easiest and most efficient way to get your deleted Instagram messages back. Just ask the other person to copy the messages and send them to you. It can also be as simple as asking them to take a screenshot of your conversations.
2. Recover Deleted Instagram Messages from Instagram Data
Another way to retrieve messages and files you’ve sent and deleted over Instagram is to ask the company for them. Like other social media apps, Instagram keeps a copy of all messages and files (albeit temporarily) that you send and receive on their servers. Simply put, Instagram probably has a copy of the data that you want to recover on their servers at any point.
That being said, you may be able to take advantage of this fact by downloading this stored information through Instagram Data. In essence, you will ask Instagram to provide you with a copy of the data you’ve sent and received over a given period, including the data you are looking for.
However, such is only possible within the small margin of time when your data is still available on the server. That is, between the time your data is uploaded into the server and before it’s completely erased. Suppose your data has already been deleted from the servers by the time Instagram receives your request. In that case, you’ll have to look for another way.
Note that Instagram can take up to 48 hours to send your data using email. In addition, the email link expires within four days after the date of receipt. Both mechanisms will help to protect your privacy in case someone else gets access to your email account.
How to Recover Deleted Instagram Data from Instagram Data:
- Using any web browser, go to Instagram’s official webpage and log into your account.
- Look for the Profile icon at the top-right corner of the interface and select it.
- Click on the “Edit Profile” icon and select the “Privacy and Security” option from the pop-up menu.
- Look for the “Data Download” option and select it. Next, click the “Request Download” button to finalize the request.
- Enter your email address in the text box that will appear. Afterward, select the information format option to “JSON”, then click on “Next.”
- Ky in your email password once prompted and then select the “Request Download” option. By this point, Instagram should send a link containing all the needed data via email.
- Log into your email using a separate tab or window and look for the email from Instagram containing the link. Open the email and select the “Download Information” option. The application will open up your Instagram page to view your data.
- Once prompted, click on the “Download Information” option to download the file to your computer. Locate the file, unzip it, and look for the “messages.json” file, which contains all your recovered data.
3. Recover Deleted Instagram Messages from Your Facebook account
Suppose you have recently signed up for an Instagram account. In that case, you may have noticed that Instagram offered to link your Instagram account with your Facebook account.
Linking the two accounts allows you to see all your messages from your Facebook Messenger and Instagram Direct in the Messages section of your Facebook account. Aside from that, it also allows you to share your Instagram or Facebook posts with the other platform automatically.
Suppose you’re wondering why the two services appear to be acting in unison. In that case, Facebook bought Instagram a few years back (in 2020). It makes sense to surmise Instagram and Facebook are most likely storing your messages in the same area or servers.
That being said, you should be able to see or recover messages you have deleted from your Instagram through your linked Facebook account. However, note that you can only do this if your Instagram and Facebook accounts were linked even before you deleted the messages by accident, meaning that the messages were able to load on Facebook.
How to Recover Deleted Instagram Messages from Your Facebook Account:
- Go to the official Facebook webpage and sign into your account. Make sure that the account you sign into is the one that is linked with your Instagram account.
- Once you’re signed in, locate the inbox and select to view all of your messages, not just your messages for Facebook.
- From the left menu bar, select the “Instagram Direct” icon, and you should be able to see all of your Instagram Direct messages stored there.
4. Recover Deleted Instagram Messages Using Third-Party Applications
The methods mentioned above are the most common ways of getting your data back; however, you can expect neither option to work a hundred percent of the time. That being said, your last resort would be to use a third-party application specializing in retrieving lost or accidentally deleted files.
These tools scan your device’s storage space for traces of lost, corrupted, or accidentally deleted files. They then retrieve traces of the file, put them back together, and allow you to restore them in their original location. While the types of files recovered vary across data recovery programs, most can recover messages, photos, videos, call histories, and so on.
In reality, there are a handful of file recovery applications, and you can probably find one through Google Play (Android) and the Apple Store (iOS) devices. Having said this, we’ve selected an application in the form of KidsGuard Pro to demonstrate the steps for file recovery.
KidsGuard Pro is one of the apps that will allow you to retrieve deleted messages across various social media apps. Naturally, that includes apps like Facebook and Instagram. Note that the steps vary across different software, meaning your data recovery depends on the type of software you are using. Below are the basic steps for recovering your deleted Instagram messages using KidsGuard Pro.
How to Use KidsGuard Pro (Third-Party Application) to Retrieve Deleted Instagram Data:
- Go to the KidsGuard Pro web portal from any device and log into your account. Note that you need a pre-existing account, and the signup process is relatively simple and free.
- After you’ve signed in, go to the Dashboard of the application and select “Social Apps.” From the list, select Instagram and you should see all the deleted and current Instagram messages.
Final Thoughts on How to Recover Deleted Instagram Messages
This concludes our compilation of the various methods you can try to recover deleted Instagram messages. Note that none of the methods we’ve mentioned are sure to work a hundred percent of the time, as it largely depends on whether the data is still available elsewhere. It’s also worth pointing out that each method comes with distinct advantages and disadvantages. For example, when using third-party applications to recover your data, you may expose yourself to some security risk. Note that some applications only masquerade for the purpose of acquiring personal data, so you need to be careful. With this in mind, you can probably avoid needing to recover your messages by archiving them through the app. However, that’s a topic for another article.
Alternatively, we have other articles that can help you navigate the popular social media application, such as how to download photos from Instagram or how to download videos from Instagram. And even when it seems impossible to view the contents of these private accounts, the truth is that you can go around these limitations with a few tricks. Check out this guide on how to view a private Instagram account. On the other hand, you may be thinking of moving your social life entirely to Facebook. If this is your plan, you will need to know how to deactivate your Instagram account.
