Formatted the wrong card?
Your photos are usually still on it. Recover finds them and shows you every one before you pay.
Or get all five apps in the Suite for $129.
Every photo you take or file you copy onto it can land on top of the ones you want back. Take it out of the camera and leave it out until you've recovered your files.
How it works
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Download Recover
Free to download, scan and preview. Open the file and drag Recover into Applications. Needs macOS 14 or later.
Download Recover -
Scan the card
Put the card in a reader and pick it from the list. macOS asks for your password once so Recover can read the card directly. It opens the card read-only and never writes to it.
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Look through what it found
Every photo, video and document shows up as a thumbnail. Double-click any of them for a full-size preview.
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Keep the ones you want
Buy a license and save your picks to a folder on your Mac. Not on the card.
We formatted this card on purpose.
18 photos on a Canon-style SD card, quick-formatted in macOS. Recover brought back all 18, identical to the originals down to the last byte.
Notice the names. Formatting erases the card's list of file names, so Recover names each file by where it found it on the card. The photos themselves are untouched.
What it can bring back
Photos
JPEG HEIC PNG TIFF GIF BMP WebP
Camera RAW
CR2 CR3 NEF ARW DNG
Video
MP4 MOV M4V AVI 3GP
Audio
MP3 M4A WAV AIFF
Documents
PDF DOCX XLSX PPTX DOC XLS PPT EPUB ZIP
Cards and drives
SD SDHC SDXC microSD CF USB, any size
How it compares
Recover does one job: getting photos and videos off memory cards, on a Mac. Here's how it lines up with the tools people usually find first.
| Shutterkit Recover | Disk Drill | Stellar Photo Recovery | Recoverit | PhotoRec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | $29 one-time | $149 lifetime, or $89/yr | From $49.99/yr; lifetime from $89.99 | $144.99 perpetual, or monthly plans | Free |
| Free version | Scan and preview everything; pay to save | Scan and preview; limited free recovery | Recover up to 10 files | Recover up to 500 MB | Everything |
| Preview before paying | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not listed |
| Formatted cards | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Canon CR3, Nikon NEF, Sony ARW | Yes | Yes | CR3 and ARW not listed | "RAW", formats not listed | Yes |
| Never writes to the card | Yes | When supported | Not listed | Not listed | Yes |
| Scans a card image | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Computers per license | 3 Macs | 3 devices | 1 | 2 Macs | Any |
| Windows | No, Mac only | Yes | Separate version | Yes | Yes |
| Interface | Mac app | App | App | App | Command line |
From each company's website on October 7, 2026, in US dollars. Several of them show sale prices against higher list prices, and those change often. "Not listed" means we couldn't find it on their product pages, not that it's impossible. Spot something out of date? Tell us and we'll fix it.
Questions
Will it work after I formatted the card in my camera?
Usually, yes. A quick format, which is what cameras and macOS do by default, only resets the card's file list. The photos stay where they were until something new is written over them. The free scan shows you exactly what survived.
Can Recover damage my card?
No. It opens the card read-only, and the app contains no code that writes to a card. It also refuses to save recovered files onto the card you're scanning.
Why does it ask for my password?
Reading a card directly, below the file system, needs administrator permission on macOS. Recover asks macOS for read-only access through the standard system prompt. It never runs with full administrator rights.
Why don't my files have their original names?
The names were stored in the card's file list, and that's the part formatting or deleting erases. Recover names each file by its position on the card, like f5569.jpg. The contents are intact.
What about long videos?
Cards usually store files in one piece, and those come back whole. A long clip recorded while the card was nearly full may have been split up, and then Recover can usually only bring back the first part. Shutterkit Repair can often make a damaged clip playable again.
What if nothing is found?
Then the files were most likely overwritten, and no software can get them back. You'll know from the free scan before spending anything. If you bought it and it didn't help, ask for a refund within 30 days.
My card shows an error or won't mount. Can it still be read?
Often. Recover reads the card's raw storage, so a damaged file system doesn't stop it. On a physically failing card it skips unreadable areas, keeps going and tells you how many it hit.
Scan your card for free.
Pay $29 only if Recover found the photos you were looking for. One license covers three Macs.
macOS 14 Sonoma or later. Apple silicon and Intel.