Disappearing iPad note markups

YES. I've read through and it looks like there still isn't an official response or fix.

I am near a mental breakdown at the amount of notes I've lost. I will spend hours reading and annotating readings to prepare for class (as the teacher--so these notes are crucial) and they will disappear for no reason and I'm unable to retrieve them. Please someone tell me how to recover them.

There is no way to Save within the Files folder. All you can do is hit Done. Sometimes, when I hit it, everything is saved nicely. Other times, 10 pages of preparation are erased. Just heartbreaking.

Same issue. Happened twice for the exact same PDF. Have lost hours of work and will have to literally skip a class to re-take the same notes for the THIRD FREAKING TIME. Thanks Apple, so much for being the largest company in the world.

I have just had an afternoon of work disappear. I was using my Apple Pencil to make notes on two separate PDF files from the iCloud files app, and suddenly the whole PDF was wiped clean. Everything is gone. How is there no way to save work on PDFs? What is the point of the Apple Pencil, if users are never sure if the work they do will be saved or be wiped clean.

I tried to recover the file, following the advice about files on iCloud on Apple Support, but it was nowhere.

A different PDF file I was working on a few days ago did save the Apple Pencil markups, so it’s not a consistent thing. But now I’m nervous to use the Apple Pencil to make notes on a PDF, because there’s no knowing if the notes will be saved or not.

PLEASE APPLE, come up with a solution to this!

Same issue here. Just lost two hours worth of work marking up a contract. So frustrating.

MichelPM, it’s fine saying to use another app but this is not the point.

Customers buy and pay for a product that should work. I do not want to have to buy/get another app. I should be able to go into files, open a document, mark it up with handwritten notes using my pen and then save it knowing it is saved not lost with no way of recovery. This is absolutely unacceptable when Apple selling point for the iPad Pro is the ability to use the pen to do this type of work. Please Apple, resolve this problem asap. Thank you.

Downloaded newest iPad OS update, iOS update and MaxOS update - same issue continues.

moving to a 3rd party now.

really frustrating as syncing across all devices and to my files app would be amazing. Oh well.

Yes and I do have the same problem too, I search it up on the internet to find possible solution but this turn out to be a bug, after taking notes I hit done and after that I tap the pdf to check my notes and all the notes just disappeared and it cannot be recovered, I got really frustrated I rather write it on a paper. Wish the next iOS update will fix this problem.

Same just happened to me twice. I spent hours editing a floor plan and when attempting to zoom out it all vanished. No way to undo or see previous version. Someone said use another app…but I didn’t see any suggestions on what free app to use?? Apple it would be great if you made it possible to see previous versions or previous edits!! Or an auto save! Please and thank you!

same problem here. But I saved my pdf files in Notes, and then use Apple pencil to note important information on that file. During the mark-up process, sometimes I scrolled back to see whether the mark-ups were still there and they really were. But after 30 seconds I didn’t use the pencil anymore and done with my notes, took a look back and bam, all of the mark-ups were disappeared like they haven’t been there. I checked my Icloud storage, check the sync status but couldn’t find out the reason why. Still the same pdf but if I take notes by my old ipad Air 2 and don’t use Apple pencil, it’s totally fine. Not really sure what is happening with my Ipad Pro 12.9 even though I updated to the newest iOS.

this is literally the most frustrating bug I've ever dealt with on an iPad. this issue didn't exist on ios14, and now every PDF I have open for more than 9 minutes crashes and deletes anything I've annotated. I've tried everything I could think to like.... stop it, but it seems like an issue with the markup feature itself. of all the possible bugs for a tool used to take notes... it's one that deletes everything you write.

Yes, we get it—we get it—WE GET IT!! Not everyone is spending hours reading through EVERY comment to find yours. They find a forum that relates to their issue and they comment their frustrations, as we all did in our original posts. The issue is not the Apple Notes app, as previously stated by multiple people. The issue is the markup feature available when you open a file.

I'm horrified to find this 6-page series of heavy complaints about this issue that has just tumbled upon me! It looks as if I'll have to just accept that my last six hours of work marking up a pdf on my ipad pro have disappeared, when I was already working desperately to a deadline. How can it be that Apple just ignores this? Astonishingly unprofessional of an organisation that appears to want to market itself as a quality provider. Now I know otherwise. I hope a few million more get to realise this before it's too late for them! And I wasn't using "note markups" either, just to refer to those here who have tried to explain that this is another issue.

I have experienced the same frustration of everyone above. Apple, if you’re listening, you need to do something or at least provide fair warning to people in advance that hours of note taking will be lost due to this problem.

Apple support,

I am experiencing the same issue as everyone above. I spent hours marking up a PDF only to have my notes erased. I'm still shocked all my notes are just gone and there is nothing I can do to bring them back. This is why I bought an iPad. I wanted to be able to annotate journal articles. Please resolve this issue!

Gonna chime in here, I've just lost an entire 5 hours worth of annotations on a document and I've got a meeting 2 hours. I'm ready to chuck my brand new M1 iPad into the trash. How can such a basic feature be this broken? There isn't even a save/save as to create any sort of active backup. And to add insult, my iCloud backup was a version from the very start of the say (my internet connection has been spotless the whole time).

And to those saying "use a third party app".

A) Obviously we realize this now, after a costly lesson that never should've happened

B) People expect to use third-party apps for want of more features, not because they expect something as basic as saving the document to be broken.

Exactly, not to mention that from what I’ve been finding online, this issue has been happening for years now. No fix whatsoever just suggestions on what to do that don’t even have anything to do with the problem and just a mindless recommendations like updating the OS or something.

It’s so frustrating when it happens especially because you can’t do anything about it too like go back 10-15 minute to a recovery saved point. I think I will begin exploring android tablets, hopefully they don’t have this same issue because with apple it seems to go nowhere.