My phone has gone into recovery mode, but I want to save my pictures before I restore it. What do I do?

Hi Digital311

I read your article but unfortunately I have an iPhone6 which does not turn on. When plugged into iTunes it says it is in recovery mode. Do you have any suggestions about how I could recover photos and contacts? The photos are especially important to me

If you didn't back it up and it's in Recovery mode it's too late to get your pictures. They are already gone.

That's not true at all! I have saved my info now twice once itunes says it's in recovery mode!

If your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch doesn't respond or won't turn on - Apple Support

I tried to respond to the original post but it kicked me out with an error message. It's probably too late now, but I had the same issue (that's what brought me here) and I've saved my phone twice from saying it's in recovery mode.

If your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch doesn't respond or won't turn on - Apple Support

The solution Lucky_5 posted took my phone out of recovery mode and completed the update to 9.3.2. My iPhone 6s failed to update and went in to recovery mode. Could not even update thru iTunes and it wanted to do a factory restore. Thank you so much!

hi i have an iPhone 6 and is connecting to a mac book pro.... not to sure about the downloading of firmware etc on macs???? any help to sort the exact problem your talking about out would be great.

thanks

Hi! I know this is an old post but I just found it and it's really useful! I assume that's what been edited out is some kind of link to go and download the firmware, is that right? Any pointers on where I can find it? I have an iPhone 5 A1429.

I'm also dealing with iTunes not recognising my phone, so trying to fix two problems at once... but if I can get the phone to show up I'm going to try your method!

What was edited out was spam attempting to get you to pay for junkware that would not have solved your issue. If your phone is in Recovery mode it is too late to save any content. If you don't regularly make backups to iTunes or iCloud, or enable the built in daily automatic backup, or don't sync photos to iCloud, Dropbox, upthere.com, google photos or the dozen or so other photo storage services on the Internet they are gone.

Two posts just above yours contain a link to the Apple tech note on this process. Here it is again: If your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch won't turn on - Apple Support

For getting the phone to show up, see: If iTunes doesn't recognize your iPhone, iPad, or iPod - Apple Support

It worked!! I'm so happy, thank you so much!

I resolved the recognition issues by uninstalling iTunes, combing through my system and erasing anything iTunes or Apple related, including iPhone Drivers (I think this was the problem, they seemed corrupted), then re-booting Windows 10 and re-installing iTunes.

I then located the firmware for my phone and downloaded it. I plugged in my iPhone in recovery mode, iTunes recognised it and gave me the option to update or restore. I used SHIFT+update, selected the firmware file and the rest is history! My phone is alive and my content intact! THANK YOU! I'm so glad I didn't just give up and restore as iTunes was recommending!

Downloading firmware for your iPhone from anywhere but Apple is not safe. Back up your pictures and restore your phone as new using iTunes.

Oh I will now that the phone's up and running, thank you 🙂 Athough with a little trepidation, as it was a normal iOS update via iTunes that sent it into recovery mode in the first place!

Things can go wrong, even under the best of circumstances. That's why a regular back up procedure is essential. If you have iCloud back up enabled, and you connect your phone to Wifi, plug it in at night and lock the screen, you should never have more than a day old back up. Far better strategy that downloading potentially compromised versions of iOS.

Don't worry, I absolutely agree with you! Wouldn't recommend anyone use this as anything but a last resort. On this occasion though, I didn't have any other option!

IF you got firmware from anyplace other than Apple your phone is now infected with malware or spyware. Change all of your passwords that you ever used from the phone, and restore iOS as NEW using iTunes and let it select the firmware to install

Thanks for posting your experience. I usually forget to suggest trying an different USB port.