I have an old iPhone 7 that I use as a secondary device when traveling to certain countries where it’s not advisable to carry my main phone in public. Every time I visit one of these countries, I buy a local SIM card for this phone, which I discard when I leave.
I live abroad but travel to my home country once a year—sometimes less frequently, like every two years. Since my home country is one of those places where I prefer to leave my main iPhone at home for security reasons, I use the iPhone 7 when I’m out on the streets.
For this device, I use a separate Apple ID specifically for travel. Before returning to my current country of residence, I always back up the iPhone 7 to iCloud using this travel Apple ID. Once back home, I erase the device and repurpose it with different Apple IDs.
The last backup for this iPhone was made in July 2024 using my travel Apple ID. In November 2024, I reset and erased the phone, then set it up with another Apple ID. Today, I tried restoring the phone using my travel Apple ID, but to my surprise, iCloud showed no available backups. I attempted multiple times, but the same message appeared.
When I logged into the Apple ID via a web browser on my Mac, I found that no devices were listed under “Devices.” This Apple ID is a free iCloud account with only 5GB of storage.
Since I couldn’t restore from a backup, I set up the iPhone as a new device. My old contacts and iMessages still appeared as these apps sync independently with iCloud.
Why would Apple delete my backup? I know it was created several months ago, but less than a year has passed. This has never happened to me before.
Has anyone else experienced this? Any insights on Apple’s iCloud backup retention policy would be appreciated!
I live abroad but travel to my home country once a year—sometimes less frequently, like every two years. Since my home country is one of those places where I prefer to leave my main iPhone at home for security reasons, I use the iPhone 7 when I’m out on the streets.
For this device, I use a separate Apple ID specifically for travel. Before returning to my current country of residence, I always back up the iPhone 7 to iCloud using this travel Apple ID. Once back home, I erase the device and repurpose it with different Apple IDs.
The last backup for this iPhone was made in July 2024 using my travel Apple ID. In November 2024, I reset and erased the phone, then set it up with another Apple ID. Today, I tried restoring the phone using my travel Apple ID, but to my surprise, iCloud showed no available backups. I attempted multiple times, but the same message appeared.
When I logged into the Apple ID via a web browser on my Mac, I found that no devices were listed under “Devices.” This Apple ID is a free iCloud account with only 5GB of storage.
Since I couldn’t restore from a backup, I set up the iPhone as a new device. My old contacts and iMessages still appeared as these apps sync independently with iCloud.
Why would Apple delete my backup? I know it was created several months ago, but less than a year has passed. This has never happened to me before.
Has anyone else experienced this? Any insights on Apple’s iCloud backup retention policy would be appreciated!
