How to See Deleted Instagram Messages?

Instagram is a popular mobile and web application for social media users. People love to share photos, videos, short videos called Reels, and daily updates called Stories. You can also stream live video on Instagram to your followers. Instagram users can like and comment on one another's posts.

Besides these social media sharing and appreciation features, Instagram also provides direct communication tools like direct messages and video calls. Instagram DMs can contain text, emojis, pictures and video clips. Messages from the people you follow and your friends land in your Direct Messages inbox. While the messages from other people like your follower fans and strangers stay in another inbox called the Message Requests.

What happens when you delete a message or chat on Instagram? Can you recover it again? Is there any way to see the direct messages that you deleted on Instagram? In this article, we provide you 4 possible solutions for recovering your deleted Instagram messages.

Can You Recover Your Deleted Instagram Messages?

In your Instagram mobile app or on the official website, you can see all the chats and messages in your Direct Messages inbox. Sometimes, these chats can automatically disappear. Or you might accidentally delete it by mistake. It could also happen that you deliberately deleted some messages, but later regret it and wish to recover them again.

There are four fixes that you should try to recover and see your deleted or disappeared Instagram messages. Here are the solutions in-a-nutshell:

1. If your entire chat with a person disappeared from your inbox, just go to their profile and try to message them. You will find that all your past messages are actually intact.
2. If you know that you deliberately deleted some messages or even the entire chat, you still have a chance to see those messages in the Instagram Data backup on their servers. You can Request Instagram Data from your settings and download this backup data. It will contain all your messages within the last 90 days.
3. If you had already connected your Facebook and Instagram accounts before you deleted those Instagram messages, you can go to your Facebook Messenger messages, and find your Instagram messages there.
4. If none of these methods work for you, all you can do is request the person to forward you the deleted messages. Hopefully, they have not deleted those messages from their inbox, and can send you their copy.

How to Recover and Read Deleted Messages on Instagram?

Now we will show you how to execute each of the 4 solutions for recovering and seeing your deleted Instagram messages.

Fix #1: Go to the person's Profile and try sending them a New Message

Note that this fix is for recovering the entire chat in your inbox. Due to some server or code issue on Instagram's side, users can experience the entire chat with some accounts getting disappeared. It appears to them like all messages sent to a person have been deleted. But if you know for sure that you didn't delete them, it is likely that this disappearance is simply due to some bug. Hence, we recommend you to try this first, incase the entire chat history with a given account has automatically disappeared from your inbox.

Simply browse to their profile, and try to message them. You will be taken to the chat inbox with that person, and here you will see all of your previous messages. Additionally, you can make sure that you are following them, and have not restricted them. Thus, if you did not deliberately delete any chat or messages, you can try doing this to see your messages again.

Fix #2: Go to your Instagram Settings, and Request Instagram Data Download

If you are unable to find and see your chat with a given account, it is possible that they were accidentally or deliberately deleted from your account. Did you accidentally hit some menus while browsing when you were tired? Another possibility is that the person chose to "Unsend" messages from their account. This can also delete the messages for both of you. Whether you accidentally or deliberately deleted some messages, or whether the other person "unsent" them, you can try out this solution of "Instagram Data Download"".

1. Open Instagram app. Go to your Profile. Tap on the Hamburger menu. Select "Your Activity" from the drawer menu that opens up.
2. In "Your Activity" page, look for "Download your information". This option lets you access a copy of all your Instagram data in the past 90 days.
3. On the next page that opens called "Download Your Data", tap on the blue button "Request Download". Now, Instagram will create a copy from their server backup of all your data. They will send you an email with a link to download this.
4. When you receive the email from Instagram, simply click the link and download your Instagram data to your computer or mobile.
5. Open the folder, and go to the Messages folder. There, you will see all your recent messages from the past 90 days.

Fix #3: Check in your Facebook Messenger messages

Initially, Instagram and Facebook were two competing social media platforms owned and created by separate teams. But after Facebook acquired Instagram, they started integrating various features. It became possible to connect your Facebook and Instagram accounts, login to one using the other, and even share content easily from one network to another. This integration of features and data between Facebook and Instagram helped users to combine their audience on the two platforms.

Now this fix can work only if you had already connected your Instagram and Facebook accounts before deleting the Instagram messages. It is possible to send Instagram messages from Messenger with the cross-app messaging feature, once you connect your Instagram and Facebook accounts. Even if you can no longer find those messages in your Instagram inbox, they might have synced to your Facebook Messenger inbox. So, simply open your Facebook or Messenger app, and go to the Messages inbox there. Look for your Instagram messages by browsing through the messages list, or searching using the search bar.

Fix #4: Manually request your contact to forward their copy of the deleted messages

If none of the three fixes yield solution of recovering your deleted messages, there is only one option left. You need to talk to the person and request them to forward the copy of your messages from their Instagram or Messenger inbox. They can do this by going to their messages inbox on Instagram or Facebook Messenger, long tap on the messages to select them, select "Copy" from the menu, and then send them to you by pasting the copied text. Or they could take screenshots of the messages, and forward the pics to you.

Final Words

Recovery of deleted Instagram messages and chats is not a 100% sureshot possibility. Due to privacy concerns, users can unsend messages or even block or restrict each other. In those cases, it is important that messages cannot be recovered, as they were deliberately removed.

However, in case they disappear for other reasons, like a bug in the app, or accidental pressing of some menu option, it is possible to use the fixes we suggested to recover the messages and chat in Instagram.

• Sometimes, the messages are not deleted but only disappear from your inbox. You can easily find them again by trying to message the person again.
• In case you happened to delete the messages and wish to see them again, you can get a backup copy of your data from Instagram.
• Since Facebook, Messenger and Instagram introduced cross-app messaging, chats can sync between the apps. If you connected your Instagram and Facebook accounts, you could still find the deleted Instagram messages in Messenger.
• Lastly, it is possible that the messages are intact with the other person, so if all else fails they can copy and forward them again to you.

Thus, you can certainly try to recover and find your deleted Instagram messages using these possible solutions.