How to Repair a Corrupted JPEG, PNG or PDF

A file that won't open isn't always lost. Often the file's structure is broken but most of the real content is still inside. This guide shows how to try a repair. It helps photographers, lawyers and accountants recover an important image or document from a bad download or a failing drive.

Understand what's broken

Corruption usually damages a file's structure, not all its data. Common cases are a broken header (the program won't read the file), truncated data (the file was cut off early), and a damaged PDF index (the reader can't find the pages).

Make a copy first

Work on a copy, not your only version of the file. If the repair doesn't fully succeed, you still have the original to try again.

Open the repair tool

Go to the File Repair tool. It runs in your browser, so the file you're recovering is never uploaded. Load the corrupted JPEG, PNG or PDF.

Let it rebuild the file

The tool rebuilds the broken parts around the surviving data — repairing the header, closing off a truncated stream, or rebuilding a shattered PDF xref table — so a program can read the file again.

Check and save the result

Open the repaired file and check what came back. If part of the data was missing, that piece may still be gone, but the rest should be usable. Save the recovered file.

A file that won't open is worth one repair attempt before you give up. Just keep the original copy safe while you try.