Kayabyte

How do you recover the photos and PDFs that were attached to a deleted Apple Note?

By Kayabyte · Last updated 11 November 2026

Short answer: the attachments of a note go back only if a Time Machine backup or a Finder backup of an iPhone or iPad made before the loss still holds that note. Look in Recently Deleted first. If the note is not there, NoteRescue, a Mac app we make, reads your backups and can export the note as a file with its attachments saved in a folder next to it, or add it to Notes as a new note with its attachments. It cannot bring back what no backup ever held, and it never opens locked notes.

1. What can sit inside a note

Apple’s Notes User Guide for Mac, checked 11 November 2026, says you can drag and drop pictures, videos, PDFs and other files into your notes, draw in a note with the Markup palette, and record audio. Its page does not say where attachments are stored or how they sync, so we don’t describe that here. What matters for recovery: an attachment belongs to its note, so the note has to be found first.

2. Free places to look first

  1. Recently Deleted in Notes. A deleted note, with its attachments, is worth checking for here before anything else. See why Recently Deleted can be empty if the folder is empty.
  2. Another account or folder. A note can be in a different account, such as iCloud or On My Mac, than the one you are looking at. See Apple Notes disappeared.
  3. iCloud.com. Check Notes there before you try anything drastic.
  4. The original files. If you attached a photo or PDF from somewhere else, such as Photos, Downloads or an email, the original may still exist there. Search for the file name.

3. Backups that can hold the note

The note and its attachments must have existed when the backup was made. A note that was created and deleted between two backups cannot be recovered, and neither can a note that only ever lived in iCloud and never reached a backup.

4. Get the attachments out with NoteRescue

NoteRescue reads Time Machine snapshots and iPhone or iPad backups (encrypted ones too, with the backup password you chose in Finder) and lists notes that are Missing, Recently Deleted or Changed compared with today. It reads only, offline, with no account and no AI.

  1. Turn on Full Disk Access for NoteRescue in System Settings, Privacy & Security.
  2. Open NoteRescue and let it scan. Pick the note in the list. The search field looks through titles, folders and the whole text of every note, in the free scan too.
  3. Choose Export to save the note as Markdown, HTML, PDF or plain text. Attachments are saved in an attachments folder next to the notes. Or choose Restore to add the note to Notes in a new folder called Recovered. Attachments (photos, drawings as pictures, PDFs, audio and other files) are added to the restored note when the backup has them.
  4. Check the result in Finder or in Notes before you delete anything.

Restore never edits or deletes your existing notes. The Notes app gives a restored note today’s date, so NoteRescue writes the original date at the top of the note. If you only want a safe copy, use Export, which does not touch the Notes app. If the note is a different version of one you still have, restore adds the older version as a copy next to the current note.

What NoteRescue cannot do

Price

The scan is free. Recovery of Notes is USD 24.99 one time, or All apps is USD 39.99, for up to 3 Macs with one year of updates and a 30-day refund. macOS 15 or later.

Download NoteRescue and scan for free

Questions

The note came back but a picture is missing. The backup may not have held that attachment. Try an older backup, or check the original file.

Can I get the text without the pictures? Yes. Export as plain text or Markdown, or restore the note and ignore the attachments.

Does this work for notes in a shared folder? We have not tested shared folders, so we can’t say.