JEX file missing most of my notes

Support
1

Operating system

Android

Joplin version

2.13.5

What issue do you have?

My previous phone broke unexpectedly. I exported my Joplin data to a jex file to save all of my work. The phone completely died soon after and it is not able to be charged. I imported the file to Joplin with my new phone and the export had only taken about I'm guessing 1-10% of my notes. I'm devastated by this loss and am looking into data recovery that could cost up to $2500 because my old phone is rare (lesson learned). Before I agree to drop maybe more than $2500, is there something that can be done by the app developers to help me? I'm not very versed in software etc, but wondering if my data would be able to be recovered from a Joplin server. My thought process on this is how software and tech companies are subpoenaed to provide people's data from devices that haven't been synced to anything. I'm hoping it's possible, please let me know.

2

Did you setup any sync to any internet service? If you did then no data should be lost, and you can just setup sync to the same service on your new device.

Regarding the jex backup you made, what version of the Joplin mobile app were you using? If you were actually using v2.13.5 specified in the description, that version is very old and may have some bugs in the jex export process which are fixed in later versions. But alternatively if the phone was malfunctioning at the time, the backup may have been incomplete for that reason.

3

No, it wasn't set up to sync :disappointed_face:. I'm not sure what the version was because I can't access that phone. I just guessed. I downloaded Joplin around April 2025, I'm not sure if there have been updates since then.

4

Did you ever make any earlier backups? Unfortunately if you never used syncs and you never made any backups other than the one just before the phone completely died, there's nothing else you can do other than paying a data recovery company. But if you do go down that route you would want to make sure they are actually able to recover the data of the Joplin app itself, and make it clear it's not general files on the device you need