I updated the anki, then I saw images did not load and I was freaking out so I went to the backup and choose a recent one and it is still not there on Anki or Anki web but it shows 12929 files missing only because I used a recovery app on the computer called Recuva to recover some of the deleted images… can you please help, I’m really freaking out right now.
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That is a very confusing description of events. I will try to help you, but you’re going to have to talk me through it more clearly.
I can’t tell whether you think this had something to do with a version update in Anki (which would be nearly impossible), with syncing (also unlikely), or with manually deleting them from your collection.media folder using a 3rd-party app.
In addition to clarifying that – what devices do you have synced with your AnkiWeb account? The email address you used to post here only has an old inactive account, so you haven’t been using that for syncing. Even if you deleted the files on your computer, you would still have them on AnkiWeb – as long as you don’t sync from desktop Anki – and still have them on other devices you use – as long as you don’t sync those devices.
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my email address for the anki is edenking102@icloud.com, I tried to sync anki using the computer app but it is not working, nothing shows.
You don’t need to post your email address here publicly – you’re welcome to edit that out of your message. But you haven’t given me much more information about what happened.
I can see you also sync AnkiDroid to your account, so you should be able to use that to restore anything that is missing on your computer.
- Enable airplane mode on your Android device, so it’s not connected to the internet.
- Open AnkiDroid – which won’t be able to auto-sync.
Settings > Sync > AnkiWeb account > Log Out.- Connect your device to the internet again.
- Log In to your AnkiWeb account again, and Sync.
That will force a rescan of your media, and the files will be restored on AnkiWeb. 19K is a lot of files, so that will take some time, and maybe a few tries. Once that’s done, you’ll be able to sync your computer and the files will be restored there.
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So this is me on a next account because I was silence. I updated my anki to the newest version on the 18th of February, 2026 and deleted the old version off my drive. After that I saw it was syncing but when I got home from school on 19th of February, 2026 I realized that all my pics were missing….. it was 19,232 missing files. So I tried to use a backup specifically the one from 18th and 17th of February, 2026 and that was not working, I tried to download it from ankiweb and it was not working. So I then tried a next backup….it was not working still…..then I went back to an up to date back one specifically from the 18th of February… tried syncing and there was still no pictures. After that I downloaded RECUVA to get deleted files and I only got 6,000 and something pictures back….. that’s why it now says 12929 were missing. I then came to the forum to ask for help and yh………. when I return home from class which is in the next 2 hours, I will then do what you told me to do in the reply above^… Thank you so much for the replies so far.
[I removed that automatic flag from your original account right away, but the system didn’t lift the Silence like it was supposed to. Sorry about that.]
You shouldn’t have needed to delete anything if you just updated versions.
Do you know what you deleted? Your media is stored with the rest of your collection in your Anki2 data folder – but installer/launcher/program files are stored elsewhere, so deleting those shouldn’t have changed anything in your personal data.
Automatic backups don’t include media, and one-way syncs are separate from media syncing, so neither of those would help if you really deleted your collection.media.
I’m not familiar with that app, but is there any chance it would recover the rest of them?
Have you also checked in your recycle bin?
The reason I’m asking all of these questions – and gave you the method using your other device – is that there is a way to restore recently deleted media on the AnkiWeb servers, but depending on the status of the account, it can cause syncing to be fussy afterwards, and I’d like to avoid that for you if we can.
But now that I can see your account, I do see that a large quantity of media was deleted recently. If nothing else works, we can fall back on a server-side restore of that.
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Hey so (i) I did not delete the collection media I just uninstalled anki and reinstalled the newest version (which was stupid on my part but anki was lagging) and (ii) I did check my recycle bin nothing was there on the on recovery…..as I did not delete the collectionmedia or anything from anki…I just removed anki completely from the drive and then reinstallled it.
On Windows, running “uninstall” for the app doesn’t delete any of your collection data. You must have manually deleted something.
I promise I didn’t, they did ask me to remove all anki stuff from program x86 account as I was uninstalling, I went to recyle bin and nothing pertaining anki was therebut I did that before on my old laptop and all my images was still there when I reinstalled and sync it on my next laptop (this was 2 years ago). I am currently doing what you said to do on ankidroid and I included a pic to show you.
Don’t try to sync on this device until you’re completely done syncing on AnkiDroid, and you’re happy with the media situation there (i.e., Check Media gives a good result). If you have any add-ons that automatically run sync, you should disable them.
You might need to sync a few times on AnkiDroid to make sure all the media has synced. Once you are done with that, you can do steps 3-5 on desktop too.
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It’s still saying 12945 files are missing 
On AnkiDroid? Did you check what it said before you logged out and re-synced?
When was the last time before today that you ran a media check? Have you considered the possibility that your collection was already “missing” the 12K files, and in this incident you only accidentally deleted the 6K files – which you’ve already been able to recover?
Had you already synced AnkiDroid after the files were deleted?
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I believe so because the media sync is not working at all…..still says the 12945 missing files 
I don’t know which of the questions that’s an answer to.
However, just because files are listed as “missing” doesn’t mean they are files you need, or files you had. If you go put [sound:123.mp3] in the field of a note, that will show up in your missing list as well.
So – after restoring the 6K files, have you checked your notes/cards and found media missing that you know was in your collection recently?
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