There are so many things that everyone needs to worry about in life, but we believe that data loss shouldn't be one of them. Still, the novel sitting on your Mac or the family photos that weren't downloaded from a digital camera and printed as part of a photo book all require a storage medium to keep onto them until they finally materialize as a printed book or framed picture. As such, storage mediums have become an integral part of our digital lives, whether our files are stored on internal or external hard or solid-state drives, or in SD cards and flash drives. There is an aching point, though. Just as a document is lost in the physical world, digital files can disappear from storage mediums, too, thanks accidental deletion, drive formatting, a disk’s failure, and more. It’s at these points that data recovery software can help.

How to Select the Best Mac Data Recovery Software? Basic Requirements. First, you should know the common features an excellent and professional Mac data recovery software should own: Has an easy-to-use interface. Recovers various types of data, including photos, videos, audios, music files, documents, and more. 4DDiG for Mac Data Recovery. Considered as the best recovery software for Mac, 4DDiG for Mac Data Recovery is able to recover all kinds of file from your Mac hard Drive, memory cards, external drives and even USB drives. It is by far the best tool in this list thanks to a user-friendly interface and overall effectiveness.

CardRescue for Mac is a data recovery tool that claims a 90% success rate for SD card recovery. It is limited to recovering SD cards and does not support other types of storage devices. Disk Drill for Mac is widely known as a versatile professional-grade file recovery software that delivers excellent results without making data recovery overly complicated. It has been around since 2010, making it one of the more mature data recovery software tools for Mac computers on this list.

Top Data Recovery Software for Mac

Disk Drill

When emergency situations with file disappearance kicks in, users need powerful utilities to bring back the lost data. CleverFiles' Disk Drill is one of these tools designed for macOS. The software will scour the whole drive for any traces of data and present a list of recoverable files. Its success depends on the scan method chosen by the user but in most cases it will be able to identify, preview, and recover the data that the user thought to be lost forever.

A lifetime Disk Drill license costs $89 and users can install it on three Macs, but before paying it is also possible to test the software's capabilities by using the free version. This will give the user an idea of which files are recoverable and which aren't and know if it’s worth buying.

Stellar Mac Data Recovery

The data recovery part of Stellar's software palette, Stellar Mac Data Recovery is a powerful do-it-yourself utility to get data back from any Mac computer. On launch, users can personalize the software's search by applying filters and instructing the software to ignore all other document types. This a handy way to get targeted results right from the start.

As with most data recovery software, Stellar scours through the hard drive and looks for traces of code to identify accidentally removed data. The abilities of all data recovery software is limited by the number of file types its developers have taught it to recognize, but Stellar can do much more than just that: if the user knows what code to look for, they are able to teach the app to look for specific file types not included in its database. This extends the app's reach far beyond the base of the developers. The tool costs $79.99 per year or $99 for a lifetime license, however, users can test the app's capabilities by using the free version.

Mac Data Recovery Software Comparison

The success of a data recovery scenario depends on multiple factors and in fact the operating system in use is one of them. Each OS uses a proprietary file system that maps the physical drive and creates a logical drive – in other words a digital abstraction of the physical hardware – that the desktop OS is capable of reading.

While the algorithm used by data recovery software doesn't differ much between Windows and a macOS, there are tiny things that make a difference such as support of code, which here means file types that the software is able to recognize and reconstruct based on the code it finds on the hard drive. When comparing solutions for the same OS, users would be smart to first check the number of supported file types, its advanced filtering options, and preview functionality, features that are lifesavers when it comes to data recovery.

Mac Data Recovery 101

Macs run on an Apple-developed operating system, macOS (formerly OS X), which uses one of two proprietary file systems: either HFS/HFS+ for older systems or APFS on modern Macs running High Sierra or later. Windows systems cannot read or write to these file systems, though Macs are able to do so on drives using Microsoft's proprietary file systems (such as FAT, exFAT, and so on).

When users install an operating system onto a computer or an external hard drive, the OS first needs to format that drive meaning that it has to map and create a logical disk of a file system that it is able to read and write to. This is an automated process and users won't have to deal with it unless they are formatting an external drive to make it macOS compatible.

Every file a user saves on the storage medium is actually a string of binary data that is given a logical address, which is stored in a reference table that the operating system reads each time a user wants to access a file. With HFS+ this special table is the catalog file and it details the folder and file hierarchy of the volume, containing data about each file and its location on the logical disk, among lots of other important information that the file system needs.

What Happens When a User Deletes Data From a Storage Device?

When it comes to file removal there is a major difference between solid-state drives and hard drives. Unfortunately, data recovery via software is currently limited to only hard drives, so we will focus on these storage mediums.

Upon deleting a file, the operating system doesn't actually remove the file from the drive but instead it hides it from the user and removes any traces of its logical addresses stored in the catalog file, which direct the file system to the erased document. Since the content is left intact and the space it occupies is marked as available to use, data recovery becomes possible on an HDD provided the file wasn't overwritten by the operating system.

How Mac Data Recovery Software Works

DIY data recovery apps use powerful algorithms combined with a database of file signatures, which gives the software the knowledge of what to search for. For example, if the software doesn't know what a text document or email “look” like, then it won't be able to identify it in the sequence of binary data that it will read through when analyzing a hard drive. For that reason, data recovery apps know to search for specific information such as the header of a file or metadata used by a computer program so that can deliver results.

How Deleted Files Are Recovered on macOS

Best Data Recovery Software Mac

Data recovery apps are built on the open secret that the data is still on the hard drive even after the user has deleted it. By using powerful algorithms, the apps will first check the catalog file about the overall structure of the logical drive and then start looking for older copies of the catalog file that contain important data such as the logical address of the file that was initially ‘erased’ by the user. If you are looking to recover the data of a lifetime – for example, due to a wrong click on a prompt while installing Boot Camp that caused the loss of a partition – then there is good news: the HFS+ file system usually keeps a secondary copy of the catalog file, so a deep scan can produce results so long as the data wasn't overwritten.

Things work a bit differently on APFS because Apple doesn't use any of the key files (such as a catalog file) that are available in HFS+ but instead a technique called copy-on-write, which is still valuable from a data recovery perspective. In other words, don't panic! It is still possible to recover your data if you are running macOS 10.13 High Sierra or later with data recovery software that supports APFS.

The most important components of our digital lives are the ones we don't even realize play such an integral role until something goes wrong. Take storage drives, for example: only when a disk fails do we realize just how much personal data is stored on that 2TB hard drive. Fortunately, there are apps and services to handle such emergency situations and help get that the data back.

If you are dealing with logical failure, accidental file deletion, or drive formatting, then it could be possible to recover the data via DIY software in the comfort of your own home. If it comes to it that you will need to turn to such software, then this just opens up another can of worms: where do you begin making a choice when there are so many tools to choose from? Well, comparing apps developed for the Apple ecosystem is the best way of beginning the process of restoring your files.

Best Data Recovery Software Mac Free

Data Recovery Features to Look For

Asking Google about the best data recovery software for Mac may produce great search results, but that's only the first step toward solving the problem and retrieving the data. Before jumping into a subscription or a lifetime license for any old data recovery app, there are certain features that users would be smart to take into consideration. For example, of course it's good to have a data recovery tool that can bring back your lost photos, but is it capable of recovering other document types, too, such as DOCX, MOV, or MP3? If so, then this is what’s known as a general data recovery application.

Scanning an External Drive

Stellar Mac Data Recovery Scan Options

In this sense, it's wise to check the list of supported file types since good-quality apps usually support all major file extensions and users can either request support or instruct the app to look for specific files. With that in place, the next aim is to check whether the software supports multiple storage mediums, such as HDDs, CD/DVDs, and flash drives. For the price you are going to pay, it's good to have an all-in-one solution because you never know what types of volumes you'll need to scan again to restore data.

While the type of lost data will obviously be one of the key features that every user will look for in a data recovery application, it's wise to also consider the additional features such as filtering. Struggling with the hassle of finding the data you are looking for in the abundance of recovered data will quickly make you start appreciating apps that provide an advanced filtering option since this will reduce the time spent searching for the actual file. Combine this advanced filtering with a preview feature that supports the file type that has been lost and you'll be certain that this is the app you've been looking for. At this point, it's time to consider the price factor.

Pricing of Data Recovery

Since there are a variety of solutions available on the market, cost is another key factor that users must think about on top of the features that are packed into any given data recovery software. While the subscription-based pricing model is gaining traction in the industry, the good news is that lifetime licenses can still be bought. It all comes down to what you'd like to have: a single program that is yours for forever, or software you that is essentially rented for a year or two. Both of these pricing strategies each have their own pros and cons.

What you'll find in the market is an average price ranging from $89 to $99 for one lifetime license fee, which compares to the yearly subscription of $79 for Stellar Mac Data Recovery software. Considering most developers allow users to install the software on multiple Macs that they own, and as such the total cost can be divided by the number of allowed installations.

Best Data Recovery Software For Macbook

But even if we keep in mind the overall cost of a DIY data recovery software license, it's important to note that it's still significantly cheaper than a visit to a data recovery service, where the bill starts at $200-$300. And that's just the basic cost, so unless the data on the dead hard drive is worth thousands of dollars there’s not really any reason to hire a professional.

Free Data Recovery Tools

There are completely free Mac data recovery apps ready to use so if you are on a budget, then that's the best way to save money on these solutions. However, as with all freeware you'll need to consider the limitations they come with: the limited number of supported files, a cumbersome user interface, restricted amounts of data recovery, and the like. One of the most common problems with freeware is that it doesn't support the latest operating systems, which likely renders them useless in most cases.

Another option is the free version of a paid Mac data recovery solution. Fortunately, all major solutions have a free version – except for DiskWarrior for Mac, which is an established name in the industry – that typically give access to almost all the utilities that these services provide, except for the recovery itself.

The free version or free trial of the data recovery app will still scan the failed hard drive looking for any deleted data, and the good part is that you can make a purchase decision after receiving the full results of what the software is able to deliver. However, after committing to a lifetime license or subscription there is no way back as only a limited number of apps offer a money-back guarantee.

Side-by-Side Comparisons and Reviews

Checking the efficiency and compatibility of a data recovery application takes time and nerves, and sometimes it will also bring failures. That's why at Best Reviews we are here to help you make a well-informed decision to get the best value for your money. We perform comprehensive tests to check whether an app lives up to both yours and our high standards and then summarize our findings in the reviews section.

Best Data Recovery Software For Mac Catalina

For more in-depth information – such as how the software matches up to the competition – then our comparison articles will be of help as they serve the purpose of putting these apps side-by-side to find out which one is better. This way you won't need to waste your time on downloading tons of apps, and instead can find all the info you need to grab the one that's perfect for your needs.