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I didn't know that my google account wasn't in sync with my chrome for the last couple of months and now that I have link again, the restored record is several months old.

Now, that I've lost all my recent bookmarks and all other stuff...is there anything or anyway so I could revert the Google sync so I can get my bookmarks back?

Update 1

I have found that under C:\Users\Profile_Name\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default there is a file named Bookmarks.bak that holds the old state of my bookmarks before the sync.

Update 2

Bookmarks is the file that holds the current(after sync) bookmark list. I replaced Bookmarks with Bookmarks.bak and restarted chrome, but still chrome isn't fetching information from the updated file.

So, I have my old bookmark information, but how to restore it in chrome.

Update 3 : solved

I still couldn't figure out why replacing the bookmarks file didn't work and aparently that's the only solution available on web.

I reinstalled everything and then copied the old bookmarks file. Then I got my bookmarks back again.

Lession learned : Check regularly if google sync is working.

3
  • did you removed .bak ?
    – Ankit
    Sep 28, 2012 at 19:58
  • Yes I did. But, that doesn't matter I guess. Chrome only reads the Bookmarks file. Sep 28, 2012 at 20:57
  • 1
    you can put your solution as an answer and accept it, so that others landing here might be benefited easily.
    – Ankit
    Oct 4, 2012 at 14:01

9 Answers 9

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DO NOT CLOSE CHROME.

Assuming you are an windows 7 user go here, %appdata%\..\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default. Replace the Bookmarks.bak file with Bookmarks file. Yes, just changing the extension will do. Reset chrome and old bookmarks should be back.

Sometimes it doesn't work and then you are out of luck. What I did was re-installed everything and then replaced the bookmark file. Don't know why, but it worked unlike the previous attempt.

2
  • I would think that you should sign out of Chrome as well. I actually don't sign in to Chrome, EVER. I don't need all my tabs and bookmarks synced between different devices I use. For me, the Chrome browser on each device should live in its own ecosystem.. like Work Chrome, Home Chrome and On-The-Go Chrome :)
    – ADTC
    Dec 19, 2013 at 8:34
  • What do you mean by "reset Chrome"? I can see that I have my bookmarks in a file but somehow they do not load to Chrome after I copy the only right Bookmark file (recovered from bak). Feb 7, 2020 at 11:43
3

I set up profiles for each of my family members on my desktop. When setting up my laptop, I synced with my Chrome profile. Somehow all my old bookmarks returned. Without thinking, I synced the desktop soon after & lost my current bookmarks set which is pretty huge. So now I had to sort out my profile AND default bookmark files. Similar to the above, here's what I did:

On the device I want to sync from:

  1. Turn off sync on both devices: Chrome > Customize (3 lines top right under X) > Settings > Sign In: Advanced Sync Settings > Choose what to sync > uncheck Bookmarks
  2. Go to: User/AppData/Local/Google/Chrome/User Data/Profile # (whichever profile is yours)
  3. Check the Date modified of Bookmarks.bak to ensure its not been altered since last sync
  4. Delete Bookmarks > rename Bookmarks.bak to Bookmarks
  5. Copy the file
  6. Go back to: User Data folder > Default
  7. Delete Bookmarks and Bookmarks.bak
  8. Paste

For the device I want to sync to:

  1. Delete all bookmarks: Chrome > Customize > Bookmarks > Bookmark Manager > Right-hand side menu > Select all > Delete
  2. SYNC - Chrome > Settings > Choose what to sync > check Bookmarks
  3. Go to the relevant folder: User Data/Profile # OR User Data/Default
  4. Now delete the backup file Bookmarks.bak
  5. Copy Bookmarks > rename to Bookmarks.bak

Done - reopen Chrome & restart Sync if required - hope it helps!

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  • 1
    But when you restart resync, it will again remove the old one you just copied...
    – shinzou
    Oct 11, 2016 at 16:09
2

None of these answers are as Simple as this solution that I use all the time.

  1. Search for bookmarks.bak using windows search. Right click on the bookmarks.bak result in the search window and choose "open file location"
  2. At the top in the address bar click it until it shows up like this: C:\Users*your username here*\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default it should now be highlighted. right click it and choose copy.
  3. Open Google Chrome and go to the Three vertical Lines on the top right corner of the chrome browser window. Click Bookmarks, then Import bookmarks and settings.
  4. in the address bar at the top of the popup window right click and paste the C:\Users*your username here*\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default
  5. in the File Name: window type in bookmarks.bak and click next.

Your old bookmarks will now be in the list of bookmarks.

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MAKE SURE TO NOT DELETE CHROME

If you do, you may lose your backup bookmarks. Also sign out or unsync Chrome or these next steps may be useless

Answer by @Quazi Irfan worked for me, had to do a few extra steps to get it to force update my new bookmarks.

1. Goto %appdata%..\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default

Copy both Bookmarks files, although the most important is Bookmarks.bak (check the timestamp for the older of the two files), and place them somewhere safe (desktop for now works)

2. Delete both Bookmarks files from your directory and restart Chrome. You should only have to do so once but a couple times may be needed. It should have no bookmarks and should have a light prompt by your bookmarks bar to import bookmarks.

3. Now copy your Bookmarks.bak file to your %appdata%..\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default directory and rename it to Bookmarks

Restart Chrome again.

Everything should work as normal now with no need to reinstall.

0
0
  1. Go to chrome://settings/,
  2. Choose Advanced Sync Settings
  3. Deselect Bookmarks (and anything else you don't want synced).

I don't know how effective this will be if you've been signed in a while.

0

Here's a copy/paste of a solution I found on my own and then found the posting for:

I managed to restore my bookmarks from backup by performing the following steps.

Make sure you have a valid backup first. Bookmarks and a pre-sync backup are stored in /Users/[username]/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/Default/Bookmarks (bookmarks.bak is the pre-sync backup)

  • Make a copy of Bookmarks.bak and delete the .bak extension to just "Bookmarks"
  • Go to Chrome settings and choose "Disconnect Your Google Account"
  • Go to the Google Dashboard: https://www.google.com/dashboard/
  • Under "Chrome Sync" choose to reset sync and delete all data
  • Close Chrome
  • Copy the bookmark (used to be .bak) file and overwrite the current bookmark file (in the previously mentioned directory)
  • Open Chrome - your bookmarks should be back
  • You can sign in to Chrome sync again. Because the sync data was reset, the new bookmarks will be synced as the new default.
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This is the other alternative I am suggesting. It helped me so I am sharing this.

I went to the old computer with all the good bookmarks, which thankfully was off for the night. I turned it on but with the wireless off so it wouldn't get a chance to connect to the internet and sync the empty bookmarks.

I looked for the bookmarks file and the bookmark.bak file, and copy-pasted them into a usb.

Back at the deleted laptop I replaced the bookmarks and bookmark.bak files with the ones from the usb. It's all there!

0

The easiest solution I found was to use the open source Chrome Bookmarks Recovery Tool located on GitHub. This method will handle resyncing with Google. Simply go to the link and follow the instructions there.

To get it back to "the way it was", I recommend deleting all your bookmarks prior to the instruction that has you Import Bookmarks. To do that, simply highlight all items in the bookmark manager using the shift key along with your mouse and then right-click > delete them. (Alternatively, you can delete the unwanted bookmarks in the bookmarks manager after it loads the lost bookmarks too.) After restoring the lost bookmarks, you will see they are in a newly created Imported folder. Move it's contents to the root, and delete it. Your bookmarks should now be back to their prior orientation.

Security Note: All partitioning of the files happen in your browser so your bookmark files stay local to the browser!

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  1. Copy bookmarks.bak to the desktop, and change the extension to html.
  2. Import bookmarks to Chrome from the bookmarks.html file.

Done.

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  • This did not work for me in Chrome 94. Bookmark were unchanged after importing.
    – Stevoisiak
    Oct 7, 2021 at 22:39

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