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Restoring iPhone when no backup is available?

I recently had my iPhone stolen and I just got a new one. I tried restoring from iCloud but I get the message "no backups available". However, when I sign into icloud.com, everything is there (photos, contacts, notes, etc). A lot of this stuff is also available to me on my mac. I feel like there has to be a way to get this onto my new phone but I'm not sure how. Any advice?

Posted on Apr 25, 2023 10:58 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Apr 25, 2023 12:17 PM

If you get the message: "No backups available" it is because there is no iCloud Backup in your iCloud that you can restore from. If you can see your photos, contacts and notes on iCloud.com, it is because the various things are synchronized with iCloud. This is good because then you just sign in with your Apple ID and photos, contacts, notes, etc. will automatically sync back to your new iPhone.


Regardless, an iCloud Backup does not back up the things that are already synchronized in iCloud, so a backup will restore the organization of your apps on your home screen, as well as settings. Everything else that is already synchronized with iCloud is not saved in an iCloud Backup.


So! When you set up your iPhone, select "Don't Transfer App & Data" and then sign in with your Apple ID. Your iPhone should download all your content back to your iPhone. However, you must set up the settings yourself again, as well as download your apps. To do this, long press the App Store icon to bring up a pop-up menu and select Purchased, and you'll get a complete list of all your previous free and purchased apps that you can download again.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Apr 25, 2023 12:17 PM in response to cremick14

If you get the message: "No backups available" it is because there is no iCloud Backup in your iCloud that you can restore from. If you can see your photos, contacts and notes on iCloud.com, it is because the various things are synchronized with iCloud. This is good because then you just sign in with your Apple ID and photos, contacts, notes, etc. will automatically sync back to your new iPhone.


Regardless, an iCloud Backup does not back up the things that are already synchronized in iCloud, so a backup will restore the organization of your apps on your home screen, as well as settings. Everything else that is already synchronized with iCloud is not saved in an iCloud Backup.


So! When you set up your iPhone, select "Don't Transfer App & Data" and then sign in with your Apple ID. Your iPhone should download all your content back to your iPhone. However, you must set up the settings yourself again, as well as download your apps. To do this, long press the App Store icon to bring up a pop-up menu and select Purchased, and you'll get a complete list of all your previous free and purchased apps that you can download again.

Restoring iPhone when no backup is available?

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