Guide Email

How to recover deleted emails

Where a deleted email actually goes before it is unrecoverable, and what to try before assuming it is lost.

iFastHosting Support Team Updated 26 August 2026 6 min read Beginner

Deleting a message from an email account almost never removes it immediately — it moves it to a Trash or Deleted Items folder first, where it typically sits for a period before being permanently removed. Recovery is usually possible if you act within that window, and usually not possible once it has passed.

Step 1: check the Trash or Deleted Items folder

This is where a deleted message goes first, in webmail and in almost every mail app. Open the folder and look for the message — if it is there, moving or dragging it back to the inbox restores it exactly as it was, with nothing lost.

Check this folder in webmail, not just your usual app

Because IMAP keeps folders synced on the server, checking through webmail shows the same Trash folder as any connected app — useful if the app you normally use has a setting hiding or auto-emptying that folder differently than you expect.

Step 2: check whether the folder has an auto-empty setting

Many mail systems automatically and permanently remove anything in Trash after a set number of days — commonly somewhere between a week and a month, though the exact figure depends on the specific system. If a message was deleted longer ago than that, it may already be gone even though the folder itself still exists.

Step 3: check for a mailbox-wide backup

If regular backups of the mailbox are in place, a message deleted too long ago to still be in Trash may still exist in an earlier backup. See backing up email for how this is typically set up, and check with whoever manages backups for your account whether one covering the relevant date exists.

Step 4: check other devices and mail clients

If the mailbox is configured on more than one device using IMAP, deleting a message on one device deletes it everywhere, since all of them show the same synced state. However, if a device is instead configured over POP3 with mail downloaded and kept locally, that device may still hold a local copy even after the message was deleted from the server elsewhere — worth checking on an older phone, computer, or backup device the mailbox was once connected to. See IMAP or POP3 for the difference.

Step 5: check for a local export or archive

Some mail clients allow exporting messages to a local file, or automatically archive older mail out of the main account. If this was ever set up, an exported archive on the same computer may still contain messages no longer in the mailbox itself.

Once permanently deleted, recovery is not usually possible

Unlike a file deleted from a computer's hard drive, which can sometimes be recovered with specialist software because the underlying data briefly remains, a message permanently removed from an email server is generally gone for good the moment the server actually deletes it. There is no equivalent "undelete" process to fall back on beyond the Trash folder window and any existing backups.

Preventing this in future

Check what your mail system's Trash retention period actually is, and be aware of it before assuming there is unlimited time to change your mind.
Set up regular mailbox backups if the mail is genuinely important to retain — see backing up email.
Archive important messages to a separate folder rather than relying on never accidentally deleting them from the inbox.
Be cautious with bulk delete actions, such as clearing an entire folder at once, which is the most common way a genuinely wanted message gets removed by mistake alongside ones that were meant to go.

If you believe a message was deleted as a result of a mailbox being compromised rather than by mistake, change the account's password immediately — see changing an email account password — and check for any mail client or forwarder configured on the account that you do not recognise.

Why deletion works differently across your devices

Because IMAP synchronises folders across every connected device, a message moved to Trash on your phone shows the same way in webmail and on a computer within moments — there is only one Trash folder, viewed from several places. This is worth knowing when searching for something you think you deleted: check the Trash folder from whichever device is most convenient, since it reflects the same state everywhere, and there is no need to check every device separately.

Searching before assuming it was deleted at all

Before working through recovery steps, confirm the message is actually missing rather than simply filed somewhere other than the inbox. Search across all folders, not just the inbox, since a message can be archived, moved by a filter or rule you forgot about, or filtered to spam rather than genuinely deleted. Most webmail and mail app search functions offer an option to search every folder at once rather than defaulting to only the currently open one.

A rule or filter can look identical to a deletion

If an email rule was set up at some point to automatically move or delete messages matching certain criteria, mail matching that rule can disappear from the inbox without ever having been manually deleted by you. Checking your account's filter or rule settings is worth doing if messages from a specific sender or on a specific topic seem to be going missing consistently, rather than a single message being deleted by mistake.

Recovering a genuinely deleted message comes down to how quickly you notice and how long your mail system retains items in Trash before removing them permanently — acting promptly is the single biggest factor in whether recovery is possible at all.