Text messages disappeared after iOS 18.1

I lost all my messages over a month old. I went to settings, ICloud, then under Saved to ICloud my messages were turned off. I never turned this off or even accessed this. After I turned it back on, all my messages reappeared. Not sure if this will help, but mine are back.

I contacted apple support about it and basically they said sometimes it takes 24 hours for the phone to finish indexing after a new update but if it’s not back within 24 hours of your update then you are out of luck and nothing they can do other than basically reset your phone and make you lose everything anyway. It really sucks. Like I wish I never updated it. Or they really should have a way to reverse the update as well. Because clearly it’s a fault on their end when other messages from others are there around the same time yet the ones from someone you speak with most are all gone.

I found a solution, with the latest update. Turn off I message and reset your phone. By doing that and turning your phone back on, I message will update with the past messages that you’ve sent. Hope that helps!

Happened to me too. Apple staff advised this was a known issue. No fix just factory reset.

I just recovered mine—in Messages, click edit top left, recently deleted in drop down the Recover on bottom right. Good luck.

I’m experiencing the exact same thing after I updated my 15 pro. My texts are deleting between my husband and myself who I text more than anybody else. It’s only keeping texts from 48 hours prior. They just keep disappearing and there’s nothing I can do. He has a 13 pro and doesn’t have this issue. I have done all the troubleshooting. When I log into the messaging app on my MacBook, they are there.

Factory reset and restore from iCloud backup is the only option. I luckily had an old phone that was not impacted, and I restored that backup, otherwise I would have permanently lost the disappeared messages.

This has been happening to me too, I just updated the phone to see if it's software issue but nothing. Only "old" texts I can see after scrolling back up is texts from a month ago that were received as SMS and Satellite. It's only happening to the person I text the most. Tried deleting the text thread and recovering it from the Recently Deleted and nothing, still having the same issue.

I just updated mine earlier. And I am ****** because it seems like I’m only missing them from one person. And it’s an important person too. When I look through the links and pictures, it says it’s all there but when I scroll through the messages or click on it nothing comes up. It’s all missing and messed up. It’ll have messages from recently missing then jump back to 2023, then forward to now etc. it doesn’t make any sense because I don’t use messages in iCloud, I don’t have an Apple Watch so am not encountering that glitch, I have my settings on keep forever so this literally makes no sense. I just want them back.

Yes it’s also driving me crazy because I had some extremely important things that like I needed in there. They’re still disappearing even more. Not only that sometimes the contact itself the name disappears, auto texts the old number even if I’ve been texting the same updated number, splits itself into different message threads and disappears again. Their location isn’t working like everything about that contact seems bugged! It’s so frustrating since everyone else’s seems fine!

The 18 update is the worst! If you haven't yet, don't do it! Messages disappear. Can't respond to inline (individual) messages. Reply icons are puffy bits of barbie fluff — certainly not suitable for anyone older than 12. Certainly not suitable for business communication.

15 pro max, updated to the latest software and a weeks worth of messages decided to disappear this morning. Why did this update do it😔. I message is set up keep forever, I cloud is good and everything is good. But why?