NEF File Recovery: Guide to Recover NEF Files from an SD Card

It should be a frustrating experience to lose important or precious pictures if you are zealous about taking photos or working as a professional photographer. If you are using a Nikon camera, you may also encounter a photo loss situation. This post shows you how to recover NEF files and what to do with corrupted NEF files.

So, I have a Nikon D5600 and I went out to take some pictures last night and once I got back to my house I took the SD card out and put it in my laptop. The whole time photographing I could see my pictures in the gallery and sort through them. Once I put it into my laptop all of the photos from that shoot were gone. The weird thing is that those pictures weren't the only photos I took that day. I took some inside pictures before I left and those I still have access to. How did my pictures get deleted in the first place and is there a free extraction tool? - PGR_22reddit.com

What Is NEF File Format

NEF stands for Nikon Electronic Format, which is a RAW file format exclusively used by Nikon cameras. Files in the NEF format will be maintained originally. The RAW files will be saved to the camera’s memory card without any compression.

Compared with other common image file formats, such as TIFF, PNG, etc., the NEF file format ensures a higher quality of images because it saves photos in an unprocessed way. Additionally, you can edit the image parameters like hue, contrast, sharpening, and more without compressing the original image. All the settings are kept in the instruction set; thus, the RAW file will not be affected by the processing times.

How to Open NEF Files

To modify the NEF file, you should first be able to open it. For computer users, you will have no problem opening the NEF files as long as your computer’s operating system is Windows 8 or later. But if you can’t open the NEF files with your computer, you can get the assist from some computer programs or software, such as Adobe Photoshop, AfterShot Pro, Nikon ViewNX2, and more.

How to Recover Deleted NEF Files

Nikon cameras frequently save NEF photos to memory cards, but digital data, including the NEF files, are prone to become lost, deleted, or corrupted due to several reasons, such as accidental formatting, card corruption, virus infection, etc. If your NEF files are missing, work with the following methods to try to recover them.

Way 1. Recover NEF Files from the Recycle Bin

If you have accidentally deleted your NEF backup files on Windows, you can check the Recycle Bin to find them.

Step 1. Double-click on the Recycle Bin icon on the Desktop to open it.

Step 2: Look through the files to locate the target file. Right-click on it and choose Restore.

If there are too many files in the Recycle Bin, you can change the View setting through the top toolbar. Or you can directly type .nef into the search box and hit Enter. The NEF files will be listed on the result page.

How to Recover Deleted Files from Recycle Bin? Learn from Here!

Is it possible to recover deleted files from the Recycle Bin? Absolutely yes. This post tells you useful methods to achieve the goal.

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If you can’t find files in the Recycle Bin or you don’t have backups on your computer, you can try the next method to recover deleted NEF files.

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Way 2. Recover NEF Files with MiniTool Power Data Recovery

Using professional data recovery software can enhance the chance of successful data recovery to a great extent, and the same is true for NEF file recovery. MiniTool Power Data Recovery is highly recommended among numerous secure data recovery services due to its powerful functions.

This free file recovery software supports you to recover types of files, like photos, documents, videos, audio, and more. The supported photo formats include NEF, PNG, CR2, MRW, DNG, etc. You can run this data recovery software to recover files from formatted, unrecognized, RAW, and even corrupted SD cards.

Thus, MiniTool Power Data Recovery could be an ideal NEF file recovery software. You can download and install MiniTool Power Data Recovery Free by clicking the following download button to perform a deep scan and recover deleted NEF files of no more than 1GB for free.

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Step-by-Step Guide to Recover NEF Files

Now, you need to connect the SD card to your computer via a card reader. Then, follow the next steps to recover NEF files from the card.

Step 1. Double-click on the software to launch it.

When you enter the main interface, you can find all partitions detected from the computer and the memory card listed under the Logical Drives. You can double-click on the target partition to start the scan process. Alternatively, by switching to the Devices tab, you can directly scan the whole SD card.

Step 2: Wait for the scan process to complete patiently for the best data recovery result. On the result page, you can check files by expanding the corresponding folder to find the lost or deleted NEF files under the Path list.

Here are some other functional features you can use to quickly locate the wanted NEF files.

Type: This category list will assort all the found files according to their types, like Picture, Document, Video & Audio, etc. When expanding the target file type category, you will find more subcategories based on file extensions.

Filter: You can set file size, file type, file category, and file modified date to filter the wanted files.

Search: You can type the .nef file extension into the Search box and press Enter to quickly filter all the NEF files.

Step 3: Tick the NEF files and click on the Save button. You should choose an appropriate path to store these files. Do not save them to the SD card as this may cause data recovery to fail.

If you choose more than 1GB of files, you will be prompted to a window where you can update to a more advanced edition. For a personal user, the Personal Ultimate is the highest cost-effective choice because it not only provides unlimited data recovery capacity but also allows a lifetime free updates service. To get specific information about each edition, you can go to the License Comparison page.

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Way 3: Recover NEF Files Using MiniTool Photo Recovery

Alternatively, you can choose specialized photo recovery software, like MiniTool Photo Recovery. This software is capable of recovering photos from various storage media like USB drives, digital cameras, memory cards, etc.

It is designed with a clean interface and clear instructions so that a newbie to photo recovery can master it quickly. I’d like to show you how to use MiniTool Photo Recovery to recover deleted NEF files easily.

Step 1. Download and install MiniTool Photo Recovery on your computer. After successfully installing, you need to connect the SD card first and then launch the software.

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Step 2: Click Start to enter the main interface. You can look through the drive list to select the target partition, then click on the Scan button. In order to find all the files, please wait patiently until the scan process is completed.

Step 3: Look through the recovered file list on the left pane to find your wanted files.

To quickly locate the NEF files, you can click on the Filter button on the result page, then type .nef into the box of By Filename/Extension box. Click OK to filter the NEF files.

Step 4: Tick the files you need, then click on the Save button to choose a proper storage path.

How to Recover Corrupted NEF Files

The second question that comes to the Nikon camera users is how to recover corrupted NEF files. Generally, the files will become inaccessible when corrupted. Several reasons can lead to NEF file corruption, such as virus attack, bad sector, formatted drive, etc.

If you have lost the NEF files due to corruption, you can try the following methods to restore the NEF files.

Solution 1. Run CHKDSK Command

When you receive an error message that tells you “Memory Card Error”, preventing you from accessing the NEF files, you may consider that the SD card is corrupted, not the NEF files. In this case, you can run the CHKDSK command line to fix the SD card error.

Step 1. Connect your SD card to the computer and make sure it is recognized.

Step 2. Press Win + R to open the Run window.

Step 3. Type cmd into the text box and press Shift + Ctrl + Enter to run Command Prompt as administrator.

Step 4: Type CHKDSK X: /f and press Enter to execute the command. You should replace X with the drive letter of the target device.

The CHKDSK command will detect and fix the bad sectors and logical errors on the storage media. When the process is completed, you can restart the computer and try to access the NEF files again.

Solution 2. Convert the NEF File to Another Format

When you can’t open the NEF files, you can try to convert them to another more common format, like JPG or PNG. Here are many online file format converts such as CloudConverter, Raw.pics.io, iLoveIMG, and more. You can choose one you like but make sure that they support the NEF file format.

For more tools to convert RAW format pictures to other formats, you can read this post: The Best RAW to JPG Converters for You!

Solution 3. Open with NIKON ViewNX2

Another option is using the Nikon ViewNX2. In most cases, the corrupted NEF files are inaccessible through Windows built-in image viewer or other third-party software. But you can try the Nikon ViewNX2.

Download and install this application from its official website, then try to open the corrupted NEF file with it.

Bottom Line

After reading this post, you should know how to recover deleted NEF files, especially with professional data recovery software like MiniTool Power Data Recovery and MiniTool Photo Recovery. Additionally, you can also try the three methods mentioned in this post to repair the corrupted NEF files.

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You are suggested to back up files to your computer or other data storage devices to avoid unexpected data loss with MiniTool Shadow Maker. Hope this post can give you some inspiration on NEF file recovery. Please feel free to let us know your puzzles about MiniTool software via [email protected].