It’s always best to use a true backup solution like File History (on Windows), Time Machine (on macOS), or Backblaze, all of which allow you to restore multiple previous versions of files. If you do rely on cloud storage, at least make sure that you have the option to recall previous versions of files (like in Dropbox). If you have a corrupt file on your local disk that then gets synced to your cloud storage, you don’t really have a good backup of that file. And note that cloud storage and other file syncing options may not be enough to get the job done. RELATED: What's the Best Way to Back Up My Computer?įirst and foremost, the single best thing you can do to protect yourself against corrupted files is make sure you’re backing your computer up regularly. Sometimes, smaller errors-like a cross-linked file or lost cluster-are the culprit in your file corruption problems and are not necessarily indicative of a failing hard disk.Īnd finally, of course, malware and viruses can also cause corruption, though in that case, it’s more intentional than accidental. Sometimes, like in the case of a bad physical sector on the drive, your corrupted file may be part of a much larger problem. Problems with your hard disk can also lead to corrupted files. RELATED: Bad Sectors Explained: Why Hard Drives Get Bad Sectors and What You Can Do About It This can lead to the corruption of any files that were currently open, including not just your documents, but even operating system files. When this doesn’t happen-like, say, if you lose power or if your computer crashes-it doesn’t have the chance to close files the right way. When you shut down your computer, it is supposed to close out any files it has open properly (or give you the chance to do so). There are, of course, other reasons that files can become corrupt, as well. Sometimes, though, you’ll have no idea that something went wrong until you try to open the file later. Often, these apps will notice the error and let you know that something went wrong, giving you the chance to try again. Your browser (or other download app) may even have problems writing a downloaded file to disk. Your backup app may have problems when writing out your backup. A compression app may experience problems while creating an archive. An office app might suffer a glitch at the wrong time while saving a document.

This can happen in various ways, the most common of which is when an app suffers an error while saving or creating a file. Usually, files become corrupted when being written to a disk.

Setup files are corrupted