iCloud Restore for iPhone 6s - Missing Messages/Recent Calls Missing

This is where iCloud restore gets annoying.

There's no sort of status, to say it's on app number x of xx, or an estimated time or anything helpful.

I have one app showing as though it's loading (the progressed circle loading icon, with "Loading... icon name"), and the rest are grayed out "Waiting...".

The one app that's "Loading..." doesn't look like it's moving along.

I'm losing interest in iCloud through all of this. Not sure I want to trust all my photos in iCloud photo library, and clearly can't trust my backups on there.

Will be downgrading my iCloud storage to the "Free" option, and asking Apple how to make sure all my Photos are back on my Mac (I think they are anyway).

iTunes backups are the way of the future (unfortunately).

not working for me still. I dont think Apple will fix this. In fact I dont think they are even aware of this. This story was covered in macrumors once and that is it. I dont see any more updates in any other press.

So going back to iTunes backup and cancelling paid iCloud subscription. Back to old ways. This is how technology works with Apple these days I guess, given their charging design for mouse or the iphone battery case.

Finally got a restore from my original iPhone 6S iCloud backup to work.

This happened a couple days ago:

1. Did a restore of an iCloud backup of the new iPhone 6S. I was just curious what would happen. It was a backup created during the initial missing/corrupted problem, right when I got the new iPhone 6S, so I didn’t expect anything useful to show up. Surprisingly, the (very short) iMessages history for the messages sent and received while using the phone after the bad restore were there. That was a possible hint that something had changed on the Apple server side of things.
2. Then, decided to update to iOS 9.2.
3. Erase All Content and Settings.
4. Restored the most recent iCloud backup from the original iPhone 6S from November 21.
5. The restore worked correctly: No white Apple screen freeze. iMessage history restored.

Issues do remain though: Despite a couple days of restore time (iPhone plugged in and on wifi), there are still pictures missing from the iMessage history. Will these pictures ever restore? I have no idea. The phone claims that it’s still restoring in the iCloud Backup settings.

If the above hadn’t worked, my next step was going to be trying mattland’s process described in his post above. Perhaps my step 1 is equivalent to mattland’s restore from the 5S before going on to the restore from the original 6S.

A part of me wants to try the November 21 restore again to see if more iMessage pictures will show up as that is a big part of what I want to recover. Another part of me wants to move on because this has already taken up way too much time. I suppose that the safest this I could do would be to backup to iTunes before trying any further iCloud restores.

Update on my current progress: Restoring my iPhone 6 iCloud backup from back in September.

I've just got home - no access to wifi at work, and the restore of apps overnight didn't seem to get very far.

My iPhone is now continuing to download apps. I've deleted a load, to save it having to download them, so hopefully the restore will move along a little quicker.

Once that's finished, I'm going to then wipe the device again (within Settings), and restore my November 14th iPhone 6s backup.

I'm trying this because someone above said it just happened to worked for them.

I've also just come off the phone to Apple support (a call-back from them, after the Exec support guy had no idea how to help me).

He's passing it back to engineering to see if they can do anything to extract my health data.

All conversations are starting to sound like they're getting round to saying "Sorry, there's nothing we can do. All your data is lost".

This really has left a sour taste in my mouth towards Apple and iCloud. I don't think I can find it in myself to continue recommending iCloud to people - and I was singing its praises just months ago!

I've been trying what someone above said worked for them. Restoring my old iphone 6 iCloud backup to my 6s, then wiping, then restoring my most recent iCloud backup for my iPhone 6s.

My iPhone 6's old backup finished restoring to my 6s.

So I wiped the device on the device (Erase all content and settings).

Restored from iCloud, my most recent 6s backup.

It progressed as usual, 20+ minutes remaining, then increased to 30+, then came down slowly to 18 minutes remaining, then rapidly counted down to 1 minute remaining in the space of a second or two.

Rebooted, slide to upgrade, go through the motions.

Missing health data. Missing other data.

Didn't work for me 😢

I had the same problem (crashed new iPhone 6s - got a new one - tried to restore from last backup and all messages were gone). IOS 9.2 on the crashed one and after update IOS 9.2 on the new iPhone - both iPhone 6s.

After thinking hours and hours what can I do, I had following idea an this solved it for me - hopefully it helps you:

- pls. make sure on your SIM Card "Messaging" is activated - as I'm from Germany see under Settings -> Phone -> Telekom Services (it's my Provider) - Activate Messaging!! I also deactivated for this time the SIM-Card PIN (don't know if this is really needed)

- reset the new iPhone 6s via iTunes to factory settings

- and install the backup once again

After this all my old messages until backup are back!! Also WhatsApp Chats!

On my first restore from backup I had the Messaging on SIM Card deactivated, because I used my old iPhone 5 in between - so I activated the Messages on this phone.

Sorry for my bad english - hope you understand it.

Here is my update

senior advisor called back and said things should be fixed

gave up on two months of data so deleted all 6s backup

backed up to iCloud AND iTunes

installed iOS 9.2 from iPhone

erased all settings and data from iphone

reinstalled iCloud back

no longer gets stuck on apple logo and all data recovered

things appear to be fixed for me but now I'm paranoid and will continue to backup to iTunes once per week

Hello all

Had the same issue today with a few migrations from 5s to 6s, the following steps has been successful on all of them;

• Ensure your computer where iTunes is installed is up to date with the latest OS X and app updates
• Ensure the source phone (in my case 5s) is the latest iOS version 9.2
• Settings >iCloud had the following set;
  • You are logged on iCloud with your Apple ID
  • iCloud Drive = On
  • Photos = On
  • Mail etc.... = On (green)
  • Backup = OFF
  • Keychain = On
  • Find My iPhone = On
• Plug your source phone (5s) onto your computer
• Manually Backup your source (5s) to iTunes (NOT iCloud)
• On the new iPhone (6s) goto Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings
• Unplug source (5s) from your computer
• Plug new iPhone (6s) in your computer
• Restore from iTunes backup to iPhone 6s

All the messages and related items photos, whatsapp etc are as source phone

I hope it works for you all.

All the Best from down under and Merry Christmas

From my perspective, it has been resolved to multiple devices. The solution has been proven as it's repeatable.

I haven't had time to read through all posts here, but this still seems to be an issue, as of mid Jan 2016! Has anyone received a clear response or resolution to this and successfully restored messages from original 6s icloud backup? And why are APPLE not WARNING customers about this???

I had to get a replacement iPhone 6s a few days ago, and when restoring from my original iPhone 6s icloud backup (made on 17 Jan - ios 9.2) NONE of my messages have restored (from the past 6 years!). According to ONE honest Apple technician, this issue has been around since July 2015! But he only divulged this when I told him about this thread. NO other technicians I have spoken to at Apple (in store, online chat, on phone) 'appear' to know anything about this as a 'known' problem. And a CRITICAL one at that! Yet there are HUNDREDS of posts about it in this APPLE discussion thread.

Are APPLE staff being told to pretend they know nothing about this, until they figure out what has gone wrong and how they are going to deal with hundreds of angry customers? Or are they keeping their own technicians in the dark? The technician who replaced my iPhone 6s (on 21 January 2016) ERASED my faulty iPhone 6s BEFORE the restore of it's backup had successfully completed on the replacement. It was taking too long to restore in store, so she suggested I take it home to complete (and that I shouldn't have any problems), but that I would need to leave my original 6s behind. How did she not know the risk of my messages not being restored from my 6s icloud backup, and warn me of this?! After reading this thread, I CAN NOT BELIEVE THIS!

I upgraded from a 3GS (yes 3GS which still worked perfectly well) in Dec 2015. The icloud backup from the 3GS seemed to restore everything to my new 6s (including all of my messages, the MOST important aspect of the backup). But the 6s icloud backup hasn't restored any of my messages to the replacement 6s. I have spent hours at Apple, on Apple chat, on the phone to Apple, and by myself at home, attempting to restore 4 times now. The first 3 times the restore process just didn't progress at all, even overnight. So each time I erased, set up as new, erased, then attempted restore from icloud backup. (The first time the APPLE technician had already updated to ios 9.2.1, which has just come out). Then I went into Apple again and they got it to progress on the 4th attempt (somehow?). But they could not help me with the missing messages problem that resulted... or have any suggestions other than to try restoring from my 3GS backup (of almost 2 months ago).

I spoke to a technician on the phone today. I also told him that when I go into settings -> icloud -> backup ...it says that the device is still restoring. He suggested waiting another 24 hours to see if it 'completes'. But it has already been in strong wifi range for 20+ hours and all the Apps etc. have downloaded. So I really doubt there will be any change.

Personally, I think that either the iPhone 6s devices (my original was ios 9.2) aren't backing up messages in the icloud backup... OR there is a glitch in the restore process when restoring these 6S backups to 6S devices. I really hope it is the latter, and that this will be fixed soon. Whatever the case, APPLE need to TELL customers (and their technicians!) about this problem, so they can make an alternative itunes backup BEFORE their original 6s with all their messages is erased! UNBELIEVABLE APPLE!

If anyone can shed more light on this, please please do. Thank you

I totally agree. Guess what.. it is mid Jan 2016 and still no one at Apple are warning customers of this!!!

I have just had a 6s replacement (21 Jan 2016) and the person in store started to restore my 6s icloud backup to the new handset. It was taking a while, so she suggested I could finish it at home. But of course I would need to have my original 6s erased and left with Apple. She assured me that I shouldn't have any trouble. She clearly knew nothing about this problem. How can this be! What is going on at Apple? How can their technical staff STILL not be aware of this? How are they trained and kept up-to-date with current issues (critical ones at that!) that customers need help with? Back in store the next day.. same thing... next technician unaware. Three Apple chats and a phone call... unaware. I have totally lost confidence in this company. Such an unnecessary shame.

Horay! I just got my messages back when restoring a slightly earlier 6s icloud backup (my latest 6s icloud backup of 19 Jan would not restore at all, the 17 Jan one restored but without messages etc., but the one before that on 15 Jan seems to have restored all messages!). My Apps are still downloading and restore hasn't yet completed, but low and behold all my messages dating back to 2010 are there! Will backup to iTunes as soon as the restore completes. Fingers crossed.

I was just about to give up and restore my 3GS backup from almost 2 months ago (as my 6 years of messages are really important to me). And I thought , oh I'll just give this another go and restore a slightly earlier 6s backup. There are 3 possible reasons I can think of that have allowed this to work:

1. I did an iTunes backup of the 17 Dec restore prior to erasing and starting again to restore the successful 15 Dec icloud backup. So I wonder if backing up the latest restore in iTunes (eventhough it had no messages) somehow fixed a restore glitch in the phone (for the subsequent restore of a 6s icloud backup). It's worth trying!

2. There may be something different between the 15th and 17th icloud backups. Can't think what though, I hadn't done any update in between and they were both just automatic icloud backups.

3. The only other reason I can think of for this restore working is that I had reported my problem to a senior technician yesterday who said he would look into my Apple ID. So maybe they did something between yesterday and today, allowing this last attempt at restoring a 6s icloud backup today to work???

I'm not game to try restoring the 17 Dec icloud backup again to see if messages come back with this one now too, to test any of these theories.

Just to be clear of my history (in case dates and ios versions are relevant), I bought my new 6s on 1 Dec 2015 (IOS 9.2), which had my 3GS restored (with messages) no problem. I had it replaced (due to an echo when on voice calls) on 21 Jan 2016 (IOS 9.2.1).

All the best.

I mean 17 and 15 Jan (not Dec)

All my Apps have downloaded again too, and are not crashing now. However, when going into Settings -> iCloud -> Backup .. it still says that iPhone is currently being restored and will automatically backup when done. It's been a number of hours since everything looks completely restored, so I don't know what to do about this. I guess I'll wait another day or two to see if it ever decides that it's complete.

Actually, you can easily read the text messages and contacts (including email addresses) in an iTunes backup file using the iPhone backup extractor and save to your computer selectively. You don’t even need to know the location and file names of the backup files, since the software will automatically detect all the backup files on your computer and let you preview the content before you save to the computer.

In addition, you can also retrieve deleted text messages on iPhone directly from the device or by extracting from iCloud backup with the help of an iPhone data recovery tool.

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