Choosing the Right File Recovery Software for Mac: A Comprehensive Guide

Top 8 Free Mac Data Recovery Software Comparison Table

Data Recovery Software Review Process Summary

iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac

 iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is fully developed and helps users recover deleted or lost data from Mac hard drives and external storage devices in a safe and fast manner.

How to use iBoysoft Data Recovery software for Mac:

Overall Experience

We tested this software on various mainstream hard drives like WD and Seagate and retrieved all lost files on Mac, including photos, images, notes, documents, spreadsheets, videos, and music files.

This excellent tool is designed to recover deleted files on Mac that were moved to or emptied from the Trash. It supports SD card recovery and restoring lost data from your Macintosh HD, external hard drives, SSD, USB flash thumb drives, and more.

Moreover, it's compatible with a wide range of Mac operating systems (from macOS Sonoma to OS X 10.11) with a high success rate. You can also rely on it to recover Word documents on Mac and 1000+ file formats of office documents, pictures, videos, audio, emails, and archives on hard drives with the following file systems: APFS, APFS encrypted, HFS+, exFAT, and FAT32.

You can use the iBoysoft Data Recovery app with all types of data loss scenarios, including retrieving files from formatted drives (no disk unformat tool is needed), as well as unreadable, unmountable, or unrecognized hard drives.

Apart from being a reliable Intel-based Mac recovery tool, it's also an M1/M2/M3 Mac data recovery software with solid performance. Additionally, this software can handle complicated cases like Apple T2 data recovery and recover data even when your MacBook Pro won't fully boot.

Like a few other data recovery apps, iBoysoft features the ability to create a bootable installer for an unbootable Mac, but even that won't be helpful when you can't boot from an external USB flash drive! That's where iBoysoft stands out from its competitors as it enables users to run Mac data recovery while in Apple's Recovery Mode.

iBoysoft Data Recovery is the best free Mac data recovery software because it offers professional data recovery functions while maintaining a good user experience.

It allows you to preview recoverable files and filter scanning results. Whether you are experienced or not, with iBoysoft Data Recovery's intuitive graphical user interface your data is just a few clicks away.

In case you are considering going to Apple Genius Bar, read: Data Recovery in Apple Genius Bar vs. Data Recovery Software

PhotoRec for Mac

When it comes to free file recovery software for Mac, PhotoRec should be on your list, although it's not suitable for users with no experience using a command-line interface. This free photo recovery software for Mac is open-source and built for restoring data lost after deletion, disk formatting, file system corruption, etc.

Overall Experience

PhotoRec aims to provide photo recovery features for DSLR camera users. But this completely free recovery software for Mac also supports a large number of devices such as external hard drives, CD-ROM, Memory cards, USB drives, and Mac computers.

Locating data by block and cluster size contained in superblock (ext2/ext3/ext4) or MBR datasets, this tool can calculate the block or cluster size using the first ten files found and then recover lost data from a Mac.

We made use of this Mac data recovery freeware and successfully recovered JPEG pictures, MP3 audio files, and Microsoft Office files.

However, it should be made clear that using PhotoRec to get files back from Mac requires knowledge of the command line, as its user interface is similar to Terminal (the Command Prompt on Mac), which is not a user-friendly modern graphical interface at all. And PhotoRec APFS data recovery is not available as it doesn't support APFS.

Although it may not be compatible with the new Mac operating systems like macOS Ventura, Monterey, or Big Sur, PhotoRec could still be recommended to recover lost data on Mac OS X. However, this freeware is not an option for people with no idea of how to use command lines.

Wondershare Recoverit Mac Data Recovery

Wondershare Recoverit Mac Data Recovery is another free data recovery tool we found while retrieving files from Mac computers with satisfying results.

Overall Experience

Recoverit for Mac claims a 96% success rate of data recovery from Mac hard drives and external hard drives with over 1000 file formats. But of course, there is no guaranteed result with any data recovery software.

For purposes of this review, we tried to delete files (up to 100 MB in total size) from the Trash, external hard drives, pen drives, SSD, USB, and Memory cards—and Recoverit Mac Data Recovery got most of them back in short order. What's more, this free Mac file recovery software has other attractive features as well.

We made use of this Apple data recovery freeware and successfully recovered JPEG pictures, MP3 audio files, and Microsoft Office files.

Wondershare Recoverit for Mac can recover lost or deleted graphic photos, videos, office documents, email files, etc. And it's Advanced Video Recovery Technology —exclusive to Wondershare Recoverit—also wins accolades for this Mac data recovery software.

Recoverit Mac Data Recovery only allows us to recover lost data from Mac for free up to 100MB, which is not enough most of the time. But if we accidentally deleted only a few photos or documents, this MacBook Pro data recovery software could be a solution. For lost videos or files with large sizes or the advanced corrupted video repair and recovery options, subscriptions are required.

Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery

Another file recovery solution for Mac is Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery, which claims to be a beacon of hope in data recovery. It works with LaCie® USB-C HDD, SSD, portable HDDs, etc. allowing file recovery lost from your Mac's built-in apps such as Photos, iMovie, GarageBand, Pages, TextEdit, or Mail.

Overall Experience

Stellar Mac Data Recovery is a free download for scanning and previewing lost or deleted data. But for fully undeleting or recovering data from a deleted APFS partition or lost files from an SSD, SD card, USB flash drive, jump drive, or USB-C portable HDD, you will need to pay for the professional version.

Stellar is a comprehensive Mac file recovery tool (if you can afford to pay $79.99 for the one-year professional version) that works with MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, iMac, Mac mini, & other models.

This software's highlight is its ability to repair corrupted photos and videos which is essential for professional users who work with Logic Pro, InDesign, Final Cut Pro, iMovie, and other Mac apps.

Unfortunately, the free trial version of Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Mac can only preview lost or deleted files, so it might be a solution when you need to monitor the health of the lost files and hard disk. But it offers no real option for free Mac file recovery from MacBook Pro, iMac Pro, Mac Pro, MacBook Air, and Mac Mini unless you pay up.

Minitool Power Data Recovery vs. Stellar Mac Data Recovery

You may find posts recommending Minitool Power Data Recovery, but it no longer has a Mac version and is now a Stellar Mac Data Recovery re-seller.

Disk Drill for Mac

Disk Drill is another free Mac file recovery tool for Mac OS X and later. Built to recover, manage, and clean up Mac data, it's also packed with useful disk tools for all subscribed users.

Overall Experience

In addition to recovering deleted files on a Mac, the built-in Recovery Vault feature and Guaranteed Recovery of Disk Drill can prevent accidental data loss from failing hard drives by backing up files with Time Machine in case users need to recover data from an emptied Trash on their Mac.

Disk Drill is available for macOS, iOS, and Android devices for data recovery, which means it can recover data from a hard Drive, USB flash Drive, iPhones, Digital Cameras, Android phones, and memory cards.

This Mac recovery software comes with free S.M.A.R.T. disk monitoring, Mac storage cleanup, a duplicate file finder for Mac, a recovery drive, data protection, and data backup.

What distinguishes this software is its ability to repair corrupted photos and videos, which is essential for pro users who work with Logic Pro, InDesign, Final Cut Pro, iMovie, and other Mac apps.

Similar to iBoysoft Data Recovery software, Disk Drill allows users to preview files it detects before they finally decide to recover them. As we discovered, this software is able to find 190+ file types that we use daily, such as various photos and documents.

Disk Drill's Basic version is a free application to check the state of your lost data, but users need to pay for real Mac data recovery. Also, it's a little difficult to navigate the main interface for the desired feature. Anyway, it could be a commercial data recovery solution if you're ready to pay.

Lazesoft Mac Data Recovery

Lazesoft Mac Data Recovery offers a completely free data recovery service that enables you to recover unlimited data. This data recovery software was released in 2013, but many Mac users are not familiar with it, possibly because it doesn't officially support any macOS versions later than OS X 10.9, also known as Classic!

Overall Experience

Lazesoft Mac Data Recovery is designed to recover deleted files on Mac, supporting file systems including HFS+, HFS, FAT, FAT32, NTFS, and exFAT. With this free data recovery tool, you can recover images, audio files, videos, documents, etc. from any mountable storage device on your Mac, such as USB flash drives, memory cards, and hard disks.

This free data recovery software has two modes available - Fast Scan to rapidly undelete files, and Deep Scan to recover lost files from a formatted, damaged, or deleted partition. It makes the recovery process potentially faster by allowing users to see the files it has found while the scan is ongoing.

Unfortunately, it seems like this program has been abandoned by its developers since the last update was in 2014. Therefore, it has an interface less up-to-date than the previously mentioned recovery software for Mac and may not work as effectively as the others.

Although the latest officially supported operating system of this free data recovery software is OS X 10.9, some have reported success when running it on macOS 10.15 Catalina. So it is worth a try if your deleted or lost files are not APFS-formatted.

EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac

EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard for Mac has made the recovery process so easy with its step-by-step recovery wizard that even a computer newbie can navigate it with ease. This data recovery tool allows users to recover deleted data on OS X 10.9  to macOS 13.

Overall Experience

EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard for Mac supports more than 1000 file formats: the commonly used DOC/XLS, XLSX/PPT/PPTX, JPG/JPEG, TIFF/TIF, PNG, AVI, MOV, MP4, MP3, and many more.

This recovery software for Mac allows you to retrieve deleted files and folders through a quick scan, or alternatively to search the storage device to find what the quick scan didn't find with a deep scan. It also has a data protection function that allows you to restore deleted files in a protected state easily.

Like most commercial data recovery tools, it's limited to the support of APFS, HFS+, HFSX, FAT, exFAT, and NTFS file systems but is unable to recover data from encrypted APFS drives.

It deals with lost photos, videos, documents, emails, etc. from devices that can be detected by your Mac, such as USB flash drives, memory cards, fusion drives, digital cameras, and more. It also has separate data recovery tools that you can purchase to recover files from iOS and Android phones.

EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard for Mac offers a free version that claims to recover up to 2 GB of data. However, you can only recover 500MB of data by default unless you share a post on Facebook or Twitter about the program. Upgrading to its Pro version, you can recover data from a Time Machine backup disk and create a bootable USB drive for recovery from a non-booting Apple computer.

Softtote Mac Data Recovery

Softtote Mac Data Recovery handles different types of logical data loss scenarios with an above-average success rate. Though it's not compatible with the latest macOS Ventura, it's still a good option for Mac users running Mac OS X 10.7 - macOS 10.14.

Overall Experience

Softtote Data Recovery has a simple user interface that displays three wizards: File Recovery (recovering deleted Mac files and documents), Photo Recovery (recovering any type of photo), and Lost Partition Recovery (recovering lost, overwritten, damaged, or formatted partitions).

You can also retrieve lost audio, videos, archives, and emails on an internal Mac hard disk and external hard drives with Softtote. It is not suitable for complex data loss scenarios since it supports a limited number of file formats such as bmp, jpg, png, tif, and mp3. But you can give it a try because it offers 1GB of free recovery on Mac OS X 10.7 through macOS 10.14.

It's slightly cheaper than other data recovery software applications for Mac, and you can preview recoverable files before making a decision. It's worth noting that Softtote Mac Data Recovery doesn't support the more advanced exFAT and APFS file systems.

How to select the best data recovery software for your Mac?

When picking the best Mac file recovery software for your MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, iMac, iMac Pro, Mac Pro, and Mac Mini, you need to keep 6 things in mind.

1. Can it recover data from my Mac machine?

If you are using a Mac machine after 2018, data recovery apps that can recover data from a T2-secured computer are your first choice.

This becomes a more and more important factor to take into consideration because the latest Mac machines are equipped with the M1 Pro/Max chip, or Apple's T2 security chip (in iMacs introduced in 2020, or MacBook Airs and MacBook Pros introduced in 2018 or later). This feature will prevent your Mac from booting to an external USB and stop third-party software from accessing data on the physically attached and encrypted Mac startup disk.

2. Is it compatible with my Mac operating system?

Make sure your file recovery software supports your Mac operating system.

Surely you don't want to download or buy software that won't work with your macOS or Mac OS X.

3. Does it work with storage devices that you frequently use?

Read the product specifications to make sure the Mac data recovery software can recover files from the external hard drive that you have.  Besides the Mac computer (actually the startup disk), most of us would save files to external hard drives, SSD, USB flash drives, SD cards, RAID drives, a camera, and many other types of storage devices.

4. What disk formats and file types can it recover?

The best data recovery software should be able to recover files from specifically-formatted drives. The main disk formats that Mac computers support are APFS, encrypted APFS, HFS+, FAT32, and exFAT which can be determined by right-clicking on the disk to Get Info with Finder.

Common file formats include JPG, TIF, PNG, and GIF (for Mac photo recovery), DOCX, HTML, PDF, CSV, TXT (for document recovery), and MP4, M4V, F4V, M4R, MOV, 3GP (for video recovery), as well as many other file types.

5. Does it satisfy your special requirements for Mac data recovery?

You will inevitably lose data from your Mac for specific reasons. For example, you can't access your data on the Macintosh HD when your Mac won't boot, or recover data from APFS encrypted volumes or RAID drives. In those cases, you need to pay more attention to the required features before downloading or purchasing recovery software.

6. Is the Mac file recovery app free, or at least affordable?

All of us want to do the most with the least budget, which applies to data recovery as well. However, 'expensive vs. free' is not necessarily the best question to ask. You should select a tool that provides the most attractive features—including visible preview results—while also being free or affordable for you, and our top choice is iBoysoft data recovery software for Mac.