How do I restore a file with TimeMachine backup?
Apple's Time Machine is a simple and reliable way to backup your Mac to a external or network disk drive but how do you recover a file or email you accidentally deleted?
To use Time Machine restore an individual file or email on you Mac
- Open a window and browse to the location where the file you want to restore was located
- This could be a Finder window like your Documents folder, your Inbox in Mail or another application that backs up with Time Machine.
- Choose Enter Time Machine from the
icon in the top right of the screen or click the Time Machine app in the Dock. - Find the items you want to restore:
- Use the timeline on the right edge of the screen to see the items in your Time Machine backup as they were at a particular date and time.
- By clicking the onscreen up and down arrows you can jump to the last time the contents of the window changed.
- You can also use the search field in a window to find an item, then move through time while focused the found item.
- Once you have found the time, select it and press Space Bar to preview it to make sure it's the one you want.
- Once you are sure click Restore to restore the selected item, or Control-click the item for other options.
