You may not even need an external Time Machine backup as your Mac will automatically back up documents locally going back for some time, depending on which program you are using (we’ll look at that scenario next). Luckily you can get the old version of that file back by following the steps below. If you just need to restore an earlier version of a file you were working on, perhaps because you accidentally deleted it, or you went a bit crazy editing it only to realise that you had made a huge mistake.
How to recover a file from a Time Machine back up Time Machine finally gets support for APFS in macOS Big Sur] If your Time Machine back up is in APFS you will not be able to recover it to a Mac that isn’t running Big Sur. [Note that in MacOS Big Sur Apple has made it possible to make a APFS Time Machine backup, rather than using HPFs. This way you will preserve the past backup history and start new backups for the new Mac. However, if you plan to continue to use your old Mac, choose Create New Backup when you plug your drive into the new Mac. Therefore, choose the option Inherit Backup. This is fine if you’re replacing the old Mac and want the new Mac to use the old backup files. You can move the backup history from one Mac to another, but after the new Mac inherits the backup history, you won’t be able to continue using the backup history with the original Mac How to inherit the Time Machine backup of an old Mac (or not)
Wait while your old Mac performs its final backup. If you don’t have a recent backup, plug in your hard drive into your old Mac, open System Preferences and click on Time Machine.Here’s how to use Time Machine to migrate to a new Mac.īefore you begin, it goes without saying that you should make sure you have a Time Machine backup of your old Mac.
Your new Mac comes with a tool called Migration Assistant that you can use to make this process really easy. You can use a Time Machine backup to transfer all your files, settings and preferences from an old Mac to a new Mac. How to restore from Time Machine to a new Mac