iOS 26 Restoring YEARS of deleted messages!

This is beyond “disenchantment”.. TOTAL frustration in 2 Key Ways:

It will take DAYS to manually delete AGAIN, messages that have reappeared in iOS 26 that had long been deleted years ago (I’m seeing 4 years at least of old texts with various, not all, contacts returned in iMessages). Is there a fix to save this time?
What does this reveal? What are the implications that these “deleted” messages are STILL in circulation (local on device, iCloud server) when the user clearly intended to delete them YEARS ago? (I researched beta testers from a few months ago discussing this experience). It’s not novel to me. I need some answers here.

Thank you in advance.

iPhone 11

Posted on Sep 20, 2025 11:42 PM

35 replies

Dec 25, 2025 6:32 PM in response to BettyUSA

Screen Record is a handy tool available and can be added as a control in the customizable control center. When selected in gives a few second countdown and then turns red indication it is actively recording anything on the screen- as it is happening including audio. In this way, a copy (a screen record video) can capture scrolling through your messages and any interaction you do with content in said messages. This can serve as a form of a saved video of your messages on screen as an alternative backup in case you lose any moving forward in this process.

Best way to learn this is to explore YouTube videos that feature screen record for iOS as a tutorial. From there you can experiment and see how it could be utilized as another way to save precious messages from being lost forever from a bug in the software.

Good to have options. Hope this one helps.