I need help investigating missing media in Anki and whether it can be recovered.
On September 15, I updated Anki on Windows after receiving an update notification. The installer filename was anki-26.09-win-x64.msi.
When I opened Anki afterward, it looked like a fresh installation: nothing was there, including my decks and add-ons. Later, when my decks were present again, many pictures were missing and Image Occlusion was not working. I reinstalled Image Occlusion to see if that would help.
The pictures were still working on my iPad. I therefore performed a one-way upload from the iPad to AnkiWeb, then synced my computer to get the files from the iPad. After this sequence, pictures were also missing on the iPad. An affected card shows a broken-image icon on AnkiWeb too.
Current findings:
Check Media reports 73,252 missing files and 14,009 unused files.
Missing files include JPG/PNG images and Image Occlusion SVG masks.
Anki’s active media folder is C:\Users\hewad\AppData\Roaming\Anki2\Hewad\collection.media.
That folder contains 52,878 files, totaling 7.13 GB.
One specific affected image is paste-0151fe3aa838d2e49e1b7d0c18278ac880333f3e.jpg. It was not found in the media folder or through a whole-computer File Explorer search.
Anki’s media.trash folder is empty, and I found no relevant images in the Windows Recycle Bin.
Windows offered one previous version of the media folder, dated September 16 at 6:55 AM, but that image was not found there either.
I have now paused syncing and copied the entire Anki2 folder to a separate backup location. I don’t have a known deck export or iCloud backup.
Could you help determine why Anki appeared empty after the update, and whether the missing media can be recovered? I’m particularly concerned that pictures which worked on the iPad stopped displaying after the upload/sync sequence.
I can provide screenshots, exact version/debug information, and relevant logs. Please let me know which logs would help and how to share them safely.
That almost always means that you’re looking at a different profile than you were before. Restoring from other devices can help, but you won’t get everything back that way, so it’s best to recover your profile on this device, if you can.
Go to File > Switch Profile – is there another profile on your system that still has your collection?
Go to the location where your Anki2 data is stored. If you’re using the default location, that’s here – Managing Files - Anki Manual . Otherwise search your computer for that Anki2 folder (if Anki created a new one, you might find two). If you had Anki configured to use a different location (using a startup option or environmental variable), you just need to point Anki at that different location again.
In the process of updating Anki did you manually delete your Anki2 folder? If you did, you should look in your Recycle Bin/Trash and see if you can restore that folder.
The one-way sync process only impacts the collection database. Media is sync is separate. What you could have done instead (and can still do if you have another device that you haven’t synced) was rescan your media to restore the missing files to the server – ⚙️Preferences > Syncing > Log Out on AnkiMobile – then click Synchronize to log in again. To avoid auto-sync on AnkiDroid, open it in airplane mode/disconnected from the internet – Settings > Sync > AnkiWeb account > Log out – then reconnect to the internet and Sync to log in again.
Thanks for your reply. I checked your suggestions:
The other profile, “Test,” contains no decks.
Searching This PC for “Anki2” found only my current folder in AppData\Roaming and the backup I manually made yesterday after the problem started.
I did not manually delete any Anki folders during the update; I only ran the installer.
I found no media folder in the Windows Recycle Bin, and Anki’s media.trash folder is empty.
I have preserved a copy of the entire Anki2 folder, including its logs. Are there specific logs or diagnostic details I can provide to investigate why Anki appeared like a fresh installation and why the iPad images stopped displaying after syncing?
Is there anything else worth checking for media recovery before concluding that the missing files are unavailable?
I can restore your recently deleted files on the server side. There were at least 10K files deleted from your account in past few days, so I will be able to restore those (which should include the specific one you named), and then you’re going to have to clean up the ones you don’t need.
It’s best if you don’t try to sync while I’m doing that. Confirm if you’re ready for me to start. I’ll let you know when I start and report back when it finishes (it usually takes 15min-1h).
The process finished and restored 87804 files – an additional 5 GB of media.
When you sync again, that will start downloading, but it’s unlikely to finish in the first sync. Media may continue syncing in the background, or you can continue running Sync until you have it all. Use Tools > Check Media after each sync to see the “Missing”/“Unused” numbers change.
When that’s all downloaded on desktop, you’ll need to do the same on all of your other devices. You can verify progress there using Check Media too, comparing the results to desktop.
After you get all devices fully in sync – now is your chance to clean up unnecessary media that you’ve been storing and syncing. [If you try to clean it up before you are fully synced, the unnecessary files are likely to be restored.] Your Check Media results above already showed 14K unused files, and there are likely more than that now.
Run Tools > Check Media > Delete Unused Media. At this first step, the files will just be moved to another folder, so it’s completely safe and reversible. Syncing after that will delete those files from the server and your other devices. You can wait until you’re confident that was media you didn’t need before going back to run the second step, Empty Trash.
Thank you for restoring the files. I tried syncing on Windows, but the spinner disappears after about a second. The Media Log immediately says “Media sync complete.”
“Synchronize audio and images too” is enabled. Check Media now reports 73,012 missing files, down from 73,252, and 14,009 unused files.
Should I log out and back in to trigger a full media rescan, or is there another step needed after the server restoration? I haven’t deleted any unused media or emptied the trash.
You don’t need to trigger a rescan – that’s what is happening already. But you may need to be patient, because you’ve got over 12 GB of media in your account right now.
Thank you again for restoring my media. Many pictures and Image Occlusion cards are working again.
However, after several days of using Anki and syncing, the missing-file count remains unchanged at 7,054. It initially dropped from 73,252 to 7,054, but has not decreased further. There are now 36,103 unused files.
Examples still listed as missing are:
010120211258 (1).jpg
01012021_1253 (1).jpg
01012021_1931 (1).jpg
Could you check whether these files exist on the server or are available for restoration? Is there a way to determine whether they are failing to download or were already missing before this incident?
One clarification: I don’t know whether the remaining 7,054 missing files disappeared during this incident or were already missing beforehand. They may belong to older decks I no longer use. The cards I’ve checked recently, including Image Occlusion cards, are working again.
The best way to figure out what those are and whether you need them is to click Tag Missing. That will apply a tag to those notes, and you can search tag:missing-media to see what they are. Perhaps they are from imported decks you’ve never used, or didn’t include that media in the first place.
All I can tell you is – if those files ever existed in your collection, they were not deleted from AnkiWeb within the past month.
Thank you so much for your help, the restoration worked! My pictures and Image Occlusion cards are working again on both my computer and iPad.
I used Tag Missing and found that all 7,054 remaining missing files belonged to an AnKing deck I never used. After deleting that deck, the missing-file count dropped to 0.
I’ve also synced both devices, cleaned up the unused media, and saved a fresh collection backup with media included.
I really appreciate you taking the time to restore my files. Thank you again!