Here’s How You Can Save Google Drive Files Before They Get Deleted

Google Drive will now permanently delete the files in Trash after a period of 30 days.

Google Drive will automatically delete files in Trash after 30 days. 

(Photo: The Quint)

Just like Gmail, Google will now keep your trashed files in its Drive platform for only 30 days and start deleting the files in the Trash from 13 October.

With this move, Google Drive is now one of many services in the G Suite products and services that follows a similar protocol.

However, there are times when people accidentally remove files from their Google Drive and don’t know how to get them back.

So, is there a way to recover deleted Google Drive files from your Trash? Will files stay in the Trash indefinitely? Let’s try to answer some of these key questions.

Can deleted Google Drive files be recovered?

Yes. When you delete a file from your Drive it automatically gets stored in the Trash which stores the file for a period of 30 days.

You can recover the file by going to the Trash option on the left side of the screen (on the browser) and select the Restore option by right-clicking on the file.

This restores the file into your drive and you can access or download it again.

It is always important to make sure you double-check every month which files have been deleted so that you can avoid accidentally removing important files or documents.

Do the deleted files remain in the Trash indefinitely?

No. Before 13 October 2020, Google Drive used to keep all files, including the trashed ones, indefinitely. The previously trashed items can be retained until the trash has been emptied by the user.

Now, files will be permanently deleted after a period of 30 days since being moved to the Trash.

Can files deleted from the Trash be recovered?

No. Once files are deleted from the Trash, they stay deleted.

As per Google, this has been done to ensure behaviour is consistent and predictable for users across G Suite products and it will help make sure that items users trash is actually deleted as expected.