5 Ways – This Media File Doesn’t Exist (SD Card/Internal Storage)

This Media File Doesn’t Exist on Your SD Card or Internal Storage

Sometimes, when you try to access WhatsApp media files like videos or pictures, you may get an error message “Sorry, this media file doesn’t exist on your SD Card” or “Sorry, this media file doesn’t exist on your internal storage”. For instance, let’s see a post from Reddit:

I have copied some of the videos from the device memory to the SD Card and deleted those videos which were in the device memory. When I try to open a video on WhatsApp, it pops up 'Sorry, this media file doesn't exist on your SD Card'. Most of the videos are blurred. I have already transferred the videos to SD Card and this error pops up.

reddit.com

The following is a display of the two errors.

If you are one of these annoyed by such errors, I guess you might be wondering:

“How to fix WhatsApp error ‘Sorry, this media file doesn’t exist on your SD card/internal storage’?”

Here, we offer several solutions to help you out.

5 Methods – This Media File Doesn’t Exist on Your SD Card/Internal Storage

Method 1. Restart Your Phone

If you cannot find media files from your SD cards or internal storage devices, the first thing you can do is to restart your phone.

• Turn off your phone.
• Turn it on.
• Wait for the phone to read all the files on your SD card.
• Access the media files again.

If this error still exists, you can try method 2.

Method 2. Copy the Missing Media Files to the Original WhatsApp Folder

When you receive a media file (like a photo, video, audio, etc.) in WhatsApp, it will be automatically saved in Gallery under the Whatsapp folder by default.

However, sometimes, you might have moved the files to SD cards or other unnoticed location due to a shortage of space, and then you cannot find media files from your WhatsApp.

Therefore, to remove this “Sorry this media file appears to be missing WhatsApp” error, you just have to copy the missing media files to the original WhatsApp folder where they were earlier stored, and try again to open them.

You will find that your problem has been solved. However, if this solution cannot work, keep reading.

Method 3. Unmount and Mount SD Card

If the above 2 solutions fail, you can try the following steps to fix this media file doesn’t exist error.

1) Open the Settings of your phone.

2) Go to Storage.

3) Tap on Unmount SD card option.

4) Wait for a few minutes.

5) Tap on Mount SD card.

6) Go to File Manager, and then check the media files.

Method 4. Remove Write Protection From SD Card

Sometimes, if the SD card is write-protected, you will receive the error message that reads “Sorry, this media file doesn’t exist on your SD card” when you try to access pictures and videos. Now, you can try the following steps to remove write protection to fix this “Sorry this media file appears to be missing WhatsApp” issue.

Step 1. Connect your SD card to your PC.

Step 2. Click the Windows key button on your computer.

Step 3. Search command or cmd in the Windows search box.

Step 4. Right-click the Command Prompt search result and choose Run as administrator.

Step 5. Type diskpart and press Enter.

Step 6. Type attrib -h -r -s /s /d drive letter:\*.* (For example, attrib -h -r -s /s /d k:\*.* ) and press Enter.

Step 7. Type exit and press Enter.

Helpful article: The Disk Is Write-protected? Remove It from USB Windows 10/8/7!

If you are still not able to access the media files after following the above methods, it means that those files are either corrupted or deleted. Now, what should you do? Is it possible to get the missing photos and videos back?

Want to know the best solution to solve the WhatsApp error “Sorry, this media file doesn’t exist on your SD card/internal storage”? Please keep reading.

Method 5. Recover Missing Media Files

Experienced users will use a professional data recovery tool to recover lost data when they cannot find media files from their internal storage or SD card.

MiniTool Mobile Recovery for Android, professional Android data recovery software developed by MiniTool Software Ltd., is recommended here. It offers two recovery modules (Recover from Phone and Recover from SD-Card) to effectively restore Android data without damaging the original data. Here, you can download this free Android data recovery software to have a try.

MiniTool Android Recovery on WindowsClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

You should root your Android device in advance. Here, you might be interested in this post How to Root Your Android Device.

1. Recover Media Files from Internal Storage

Step 1. Click on Recover from Phone.

Install MiniTool Mobile Recovery for Android on your PC. Double-click on the software’s icon to open it, and then you will enter its main interface. Here, to solve the “sorry this media file doesn’t exist on your internal storage” error, you can choose the Recover from Phone module.

Step 2. Connect device.

Connect your Android device to your PC via a USB cable. After that, MiniTool Mobile Recovery for Android will automatically detect the connected device.

Step 3. Enable USB debugging mode.

Different Android OS versions have different steps to enable USB debugging. The following window shows 4 different kinds of guidance. You should choose the corresponding guidance according to your Android version and then follow this detailed graphic procedure to enable USB debugging.

Step 4. Allow USB debugging.

If it is the first time your Android device is connected to the PC, USB debugging authorization is required. It is suggested to check Always allow from this computer and click on the OK button on your phone or tablet to avoid authorization next time.

Step 5. Select a scan method.

This software offers two scan modes:

• Quick Scan will scan your device in a fast way, but it only supports recovering deleted contacts, short messages, and call records.
• Deep Scan will scan the entire device so that more files could be recovered. Note that this mode may cost more time, please wait patiently.

Here, we take Deep Scan for example and then click Next in the lower right corner to continue.

Step 6. Analyze device.

After choosing a suitable scan method, MiniTool Mobile Recovery Android will begin to analyze data on the Android device and then scan your device.

Step 7. Check all needed items to recover.

After scanning, this software will list data types on the left side of this interface. You will find that partial data types are marked in blue, which means the software found files of such types. Conversely, a gray icon means that no useful data was found.

Here, to recover pictures and videos, you can choose Camera, Screenshot, App Picture, Picture, and Multimedia from the listed category and view the items one by one.

After that, you can check the items you want to recover and click on Recover in the lower right corner to get a small pop-out window with the software default storage path.

Next, you can click the Recover button in this small window if you want to save these items to the default path. Or, you can click on the Browse button and select a proper location from the second pop-out window to save the selected data.

For more detailed information, you can watch this video tutorial:

“Hi! I effectively find missing media files from my Android internal storage. Now, I want to share this solution with all of you.”Click to Tweet

2. Recover Missing Media Files from SD Card

If you get the “sorry this media file doesn’t exist on your SD card” error, you can also try using MiniTool Mobile Recovery for Android to get lost data back.

The steps are:

Step 1. Launch MiniTool Mobile Recovery for Android, and then choose the Recover from SD-Card feature on the right side.

Step 2. Connect your SD card to your computer via a card reader, and then click the Next button to continue.

Sep 3. Select the SD card you want to recover its media files and then click the Next button.

Step 4. At this time, this software will analyze the SD card, and then automatically scan for data saved on the card.

Step 5. Select all needed media files and save them to a safe place (Do not store checked files on the original SD card. Otherwise, the original data could be overwritten and there is no way to recover them).

How to Recover Data From SD Card Fomatted as Internal Memory

Are you looking for a way to recover data from SD card formatted as internal memory? Get detailed instructions from this step-by-step tutorial.

Read More

Top Recommendation

When it comes to recovering pictures and videos from an SD card, you can also try using another professional data recovery tool – MiniTool Photo Recovery.

This professional, read-only, and easy-to-use software is specialized in recovering photos as well as videos from SD cards, USB drives, internal hard drives, and other storage devices. Next, let’s see how to recover media files (pictures and videos) from SD cards via this tool.

Step 1. Download MiniTool Photo Recovery and install it on your computer, and then launch it to get its main interface as follows. Now, connect your SD card to PC and select the Start button to start media file recovery.

MiniTool Windows Photo RecoveryClick to Download100%Clean & Safe

Step 2. Select the SD card containing lost data and then click the Scan button.

Step 3. Select all needed files, and then click the Save button to choose a suitable location on your computer to save them.

Bottom Line

Here, we offer 3 useful tips to help you avoid the “Sorry, this media file doesn’t exist on your SD Card” error.

1) Make sure that your SD card is not set to read-only mode.

2) Make sure that your SD card is healthy and works properly.

3) Make sure there is enough free space on your SD card to save WhatsApp media files.

Hope these solutions can help you fix the WhatsApp error “Sorry, this media file doesn’t exist on your SD card/internal storage” and retrieve your missing media files.

If you have any other good solutions for this error, please share them with us by writing them in the following comment zone. We appreciate your time for this.

If you have any questions about using MiniTool software, please contact us via [email protected], and we will solve it as soon as possible.