Reviewed October 30, 2026 · Kinori Labs editorial

Name the failure you are preparing for

A spare copy on the same phone helps with some mistakes but does not help when the phone is stolen or destroyed. A backup strategy needs an independent location and the credentials to use it. Decide whether you need to survive accidental deletion, app corruption, device loss or all three. Each failure can require a different check.

Create a small reference collection

Use a few non-sensitive photos, a short video and a PDF. Note the item count, filenames, file sizes and an obvious detail inside each file. If technical tools are comfortable for you, record checksums of the original files. An archive existing on disk proves that bytes were written; it does not prove that the right files can be recovered.

Restore into an empty destination

Follow the app’s documented restore process on a clean destination. Keep your original collection intact during the test. Confirm the count, open every sample and compare the originals. Test the wrong passphrase as well: the process should reject it without destroying existing data. If restoration replaces rather than merges a library, learn that behavior before using it on a real collection.

Repeat after meaningful changes

Keep a dated note of the last successful restore, the archive format and where its secret is stored. Test again after changing credentials, changing devices or updating an archive format. Apple device backup and an app’s own encrypted export can serve different purposes; verify both if you depend on both. Vaultary’s planned portable archive is designed to make this workflow explicit, with release dependent on restore validation. There is no company account recovery service promised here.

Primary source

Apple’s official documentation. System behavior varies by software version and settings. Review the current instructions on your device.

How we’re approaching Vaultary · Our recovery principles

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