How to Repair Corrupted Files After Recovery in Windows 10, 8, 7

How to fix corrupted files on Windows 10, 8, or, 7? Corrupted file repair software free download to repair damaged photos, videos, word, excel, and powerpoint after recovery. Or you can try to repair corrupted files by performing a hard disk check, using CHKDSK or SFC /scannow command, changing file format, or even use an online file repair tool.

Table of Contents

About the Author

Reviews and Awards

Apply to: all editions of Windows 10, Windows 8, and Windows 7, including 32-bit and 64-bit versions

File corruption occurs unexpectedly from time to time, and it is not specific to a particular file format. Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, photo, video, or other media file may damage due to various reasons with showing the following error messages when you try to open it:

If you happen to meet any of these file corrupted messages, try the solutions in this article to repair damaged files in Windows 10.

Corrupted File Repair Software Free Download to Fix Damaged FilesВ

The most effective way to fix corrupted files is by using a file repair utility. EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard, robust data recovery and data repair tool, enables you to repair and restore lost/existing corrupted photos, videos, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or other files under all corruption scenarios.

Being an efficient file repair tool, EaseUS file recovery and repair software is competent to:

• Repair corrupted Excel/Word fileВ after recovery
• Repair corrupted and damaged JPEG or JPG files
• Fix damaged MP4 and MOV filesВ on Windows and Mac
• Fix multiple broken files at the same time
• Repair damaged files from PC, laptop, external hard drive, SD card, USB flash drive, etc.
• Preview the repaired files for free

Now, download and use EaseUS file repair tool to fix corrupted files in Windows 10, 8, and 7 with a few clicks.В

Step 1. Select a disk location where the corrupt files are saved. Click «Scan» to start finding the corrupt files and repairing.

Step 2. EaseUS data recovery software will run immediately to scan all over the selected drive to find lost and corrupted files as many as possible. After the scan, you’ll go to the repair session as soon as the software detects corruption. Wait patiently until the repair ends. You can use the «Filter» to quickly locate the specific file type you’re trying to repair.

Step 3.В Double-click on a file lets you preview the file quality. Select the target file and click «Recover». You should save the repaired corrupted files to a different location to avoid data overwriting.

Video tutorial on how to recover and repair corrupted files on Windows 10 easily:

More Methods to Repair Corrupted Files Windows 10/8/7

If you don’t plan to install any third-party file repair software locally, you can try fixes below to see if you can fix your corrupted file.

1.В Check Disk to Fix Corrupted Files

If there are file system errors on your hard drive that cause the file damage, you can scan your disk to repair corrupted files.

Step 1.В OpenВ File ExplorerВ > right-click the HDD/SSD you want to scan > choose «Properties».

Step 2.В Under the «Tools»В tab > click the «Check»В button under the Error-checking section.

Step 3.В Next, you can choose to «Scan drive»В if wanted or «Repair drive»В if errors were found.

Step 4. When the scanning finishes, click on the Show Details link to see the Chkdsk log in Event Viewer.

2. Use the CHKDSK Command

If your hard drive hasВ logicalВ bad sectors, or its file system has corrupted, you can’t access the filesВ saved on it. In this case, you can use CHKDSK utility to fix the affected diskВ to repair corrupted files.

Step 1.В Click the Search box, typeВ CMD. Right-click the Command Prompt and choose «Run as administrator».

Step 2. TypeВ E: /f /r /x, hit the Enter. Here you can replace E with your drive letter.В

After the fix, you may view your JPEG photosВ if the damage is caused by a bad sector or corrupted file system. If not, move to the following solutions.В

3. RunВ the SFC /scannow Command

SFC is short for System File Checker. This command scans all protected system files for corruption. It attempts to repair the system fileВ by copying a cached copy of each corrupted file from the system32\dllcache folder.

Step 1.В Press Win + X to bring up the Power User menu and select Command Prompt.

Step 2.В Type: sfc /scannow and hit «Enter».

4. Change the File FormatВ В

OpeningВ a corrupted ExcelВ or WordВ file, but only to find there is no data. You can try to repair corrupted Excel or Word by saving it as another format.

Step 1.В Open corrupted Word or Excel file and go to «Save As».

Step 2.В Select «Web Page» from the possible file formats. Make sure that the whole Excel file is selected and then click «Save».

Step 3. Find the saved file and right-click on it, select «Open with» > «Microsoft Office Excel».

Step 4.В If the file can be opened usually, go to «Save As» and choose an Excel format .xls or .xlsx. Then, the corrupted Excel file will be recovered.

5. Restore Corrupted FilesВ from Previous Versions

Another practical solution to fixВ corrupted files is to restore from the previous versions, which come from File History or from restore points.

Note:В If you haven’t enabled Windows file backup in advance, this method is useless.

Step 1.В Find the damaged file, right-click it, and select «Properties».

Step 2.В Go to Previous Versions, find and select the latest version or the right version before Excel crashes, deleted or saved, click «Restore».

6. Use an Online File Repair Tool

You still have the chance to repair damaged files with an online file repair tool. This kind of file repair approach is easy to operate, generally, you just need to upload the damaged file, perform the repair, and then download fixed documents.

However, this type of software has the following disadvantages in common:

• File data privacy cannot be guaranteed. Others may save the file you upload for other purposes.
• The repair speed is generally slow.
• The cost is expensive. After testing, most online repair tools are charged by quantity, e.g., $10 for a document

Therefore, think twice before you fix corrupted files with an online tool. If you would like to try, OnlineFile.RepairВ is a nice one.

To Sum Up

There are seven methods in all to help you repair corrupted files in Windows 10. If you don’t want to use any extra tools, you can try the built-in Windows utilities for free, such as disk check tool, CHKDSK or SFC /scannowВ command, or use the File HistoryВ feature to restore damaged files from previous versions.

While if these methods aren’t feasible or you like to resort to a professional file repair software, EaseUS file repair tool is a great option. Integrated with advanced file repair technology, it can repair any data file quickly and effectively.

Furthermore, EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard has a high reputation in the field of data recovery. It is good at emptied recycle bin recovery, deleted recovery, formatted recovery, lost partition recovery, RAW recovery, OS crash recovery, virus attack recovery, and more.В В

Why Files Become Corrupted or Damaged

There are various reasons why files become corrupted. These include:

• Power outage, computer crash, or bugs in the operating system may lead to files corrupted
• If the hard drive or the storage device has some bad sectors.
• The presence of malware and viruses on your storage device
• A Bad update or unexpected computer shutdown
• Files are stored in memory in a cluster

Knowing these causes, we can effectively avoid files getting corrupted or damaged in these aspects.

FAQs About How to Fix Corrupted Files in Windows 10В

Here are a few questions related to how to repair corrupted files. If you also have any of these problems, you can find the methods here.В

What is a corrupted file?

Corrupted files are files that suddenly become inaccessibleВ or unreadable. There are several reasons why a file gets corrupted, like virus infection, power outage, hard drive problems, and so on. When you try to open a damaged file, you will see an error that says something like, «The file is corrupt and cannot be opened» or «The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable».

How can I repair corrupted Word files?

EaseUS Data Recovery can repair damaged Word/Excel/PowerPointВ documents, corrupted videos, or crashed JPEG/JPG during the preview process. If your Word document becomes corruptedВ because of virus attack, hard drive error, OS crash, this method can repair your word file effectively.

Step 1. Launch EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard, and then scan the missing or damaged word files.

StepВ 2. Find the damaged files through the filter, file path, search, etc.. This program will automatically repair corrupted and damaged files.

Step 3.В Click Recover to save the repaired word files to a safe location.

How can I recover corrupted files for free?

You can use EaseUS free file recoveryВ and repair tool to recover corrupted files up to 2GB in simple steps: scan > preview and repair > restore.

How can I repair corrupted JPEG files?

Try EaseUS file repair tool to fix corrupted JPEG or JPG pictures caused bad sectors on hard disk, operating system bugs, system file damage, etc.. It can recover thumbnails of severely damaged JPEG files from PC, laptop, external hard drive, SD card, USB flash drive, and other storage devices.

How to Fix Corrupted Files

There are several ways to repair that corrupted file

Corrupted files can occur on any file type, including Word, Excel, PDF, image files, and Windows system files. When this occurs, you’ll see an error that says something like, «The file is corrupt and cannot be opened,» or «The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable.» Another message that you’ll see is, «Word found unreadable content in [filename]. Do you want to recover the contents of this document?»

These errors occur when you double-click the file to open it, or when you attempt to open it from within an application. If you encounter one of these messages, here are some ways to fix the problem.

These fixes apply to all editions of Windows 10, Windows 8, and Windows 7, including 32-bit and 64-bit versions.

Causes of Corrupted Files

There are a number of reasons files can get corrupted. One common reason is that the sector on the hard disk where the file is stored had physical damage. A sector with physical damage is known as a bad sector.

In other cases, multiple files are allocated to the same space in memory, triggering a corrupted file error. Files are stored in memory in a cluster, and sometimes a bug in the operating system, or a computer crash, may lead to two files getting assigned to the same cluster.

Viruses that erroneously mark hard drive sectors as bad can also lead to files getting corrupted.

How to Fix Corrupted Files

Corrupt file errors can be unpredictable and can happen when least expected. A corrupt file can be repaired only about half the time. Try these fixes to see if you can get to the bottom of your corrupt file error.

Perform a check disk on the hard drive. Running this tool scans the hard drive and attempts to recover bad sectors. After the sectors are repaired, reopen your file again to see if it’s no longer corrupted.

Use the CHKDSK command. This is the command version of the tool we looked at above. It’s worth a try if the check disk tool failed.

Use the SFC /scannow command. This command aims to find and repair corrupt Windows system files.

Change the file format. Use a free file converter app, or open the file with any application that automatically converts from other file formats. For example, open a corrupted Word document with a PDF app to launch a file-conversion utility. Often, a file conversion alone repairs a corrupt file.

Use file repair software. If you’re desperate to fix the file and recover your information, try a file repair utility. There are both free and paid tools, such as Hetman, Repair Toolbox, or FileRepair. Try Digital Video Repair for corrupt video files, Zip Repair for corrupt ZIP files, or OfficeFIX to repair Microsoft Office files.

Protect Files From Corruption

Since file corruption can happen on any file and for many reasons, it’s important to make regular backups of your files. Use backup software to keep your important files backed up at all times. This way, if a file is corrupted, you can recover it from the backup.