Pricing guide · 2026

How much does data recovery cost?

A straight answer, with no phone-quote guesswork. Data recovery starts at £250 + VAT, and your exact price is fixed in writing after a free diagnostic — with no fix, no fee on most jobs. Here's what each job type costs, what changes the price, and how to avoid paying more than you should.

Free 48-hour diagnostic
Fixed written quote
No fix, no fee · most jobs
// starting prices

From £250 + VAT.

Your exact price is confirmed in writing after the free diagnostic — never before.

£250
Cards & USB
£300
Single drives
£500
RAID & NAS, from
£1,250
SAN, from
48 hr
Free diagnostic
No fix
No fee, most jobs
// what changes the price

What affects the price.

Two drives with the same fault cost the same, whatever their size. What really moves the price is how the device failed and how complex it is to rebuild.

01

Logical vs physical failure

Logical faults — deleted files, corruption, a lost partition — are software-level work. Physical faults — failed heads, a dead board, NAND-level repair — need donor parts and bench time, so they cost more.

02

Device type

A single USB stick or card is the lowest tier; a single hard drive, SSD or laptop the next; multi-disk RAID, NAS and servers more again because every disk has to be imaged and the array rebuilt.

03

Array complexity

RAID, NAS and SAN pricing depends on the number of disks, the RAID level, and whether a failed rebuild or controller has scrambled the configuration we have to reconstruct.

04

Donor parts

Some physical recoveries need a matched donor drive for heads or boards. That's reflected in the quote and is why drive-level repairs take a 50% deposit up front.

// price ranges

Hard drive, SSD & RAID price ranges.

Starting prices by job type, excluding VAT. Your exact price is confirmed in writing after the free diagnostic.

£250+ VAT
Memory cards & USB sticks
SD, microSD, CF cards and USB flash drives
£300+ VAT
Hard drives & single drives
Internal & external HDDs, SSDs and laptops
£300+ VAT
Mac & MacBook
APFS / HFS+, T2 & Apple Silicon, FileVault
from £500+ VAT
RAID & multi-disk
RAID arrays and multi-disk recovery
from £500+ VAT
NAS & multi-disk
Synology, QNAP, WD and other NAS units
£800+ VAT
CCTV / DVR / NVR
Hikvision, Dahua, Swann, embedded systems
from £800+ VAT
Forensic & investigation
Chain-of-custody, court-ready reports
from £1,250+ VAT
SAN & enterprise storage
Enterprise SAN and datastore systems
·All prices exclude VAT, added at the standard UK rate. These are starting prices — the exact cost depends on the fault and is fixed in writing before any work begins.
·No fix, no fee applies to most jobs. Physical drive-level repairs (head swaps, board rebuilds) take a 50% deposit to cover donor parts and bench time.
// every device

Every device, priced.

Where pricing starts for each device type, and what we recover. Tap through for the full detail and device-specific costs.

DeviceWhat we recoverFrom
Hard DriveClicking or grinding heads, dead boards, firmware faults — internal & external HDD£300details →
SSD & NVMeNVMe, M.2 and SATA SSDs — controller failure, sudden death, bricked firmware£300details →
USB StickSnapped sticks, dead controllers, monolithic chip-off recovery£250details →
Memory CardSD, microSD & CF — not-formatted errors, corruption, bent or broken cards£250details →
Mac & MacBookAPFS & HFS+, T2 & Apple Silicon, FileVault and fused storage (soldered from £550)£300details →
Laptop & PCWindows laptops and desktops with a single internal drive£300details →
RAID ArrayRAID 0/1/5/6/10/50 — controller failure and failed-rebuild recoveryfrom £500details →
NASSynology, QNAP & WD — Btrfs/ext4/ZFS, SHR and crashed volumesfrom £500details →
ServerHP, Dell & Lenovo — VMware/Hyper-V volumes and multi-disk arraysfrom £500details →
SANEnterprise SAN and datastores — multi-array storage systemsfrom £1,250details →
CCTV / DVR / NVRHikvision, Dahua & Swann — proprietary filesystems to a working timeline£800details →
// your protection

Why 'no fix, no fee' protects you.

Recovery should never be a gamble on a vague phone estimate. Our pricing is built so you always know where you stand: a free written diagnostic comes first, usually within 48 hours, so you find out exactly what failed and what's recoverable at no cost. Then you get a fixed price in writing — not a range, not a "starting from" — and no chargeable work happens until you approve it. On most jobs, if we can't recover your data you don't pay the recovery fee. The only exceptions are physical drive-level repairs, CCTV/DVR and forensic work, which take significant specialist time win or lose, and so take a 50% deposit up front with the balance due only on success.

// buyer beware

Why the cheapest quote can cost more.

A headline price of "£49 data recovery" almost always changes once the device is opened — the low number gets you in the door, then the real cost appears. Worse, a cheap provider that opens a failed drive outside a clean-air environment, or runs software on failing hardware, can make the data permanently unrecoverable before a specialist ever sees it. The price that matters is the fixed, written one you approve before any work — and the value is in getting the recovery right the first time, because there's rarely a second attempt at a failing drive. That's why we diagnose free, quote in writing, and recover everything in-house without outsourcing.

// cost faq

Data recovery cost, answered.

The pricing questions we're asked most.

It starts at £250 + VAT for memory cards and USB sticks, £300 + VAT for a single hard drive, SSD, laptop or Mac, from £500 + VAT for RAID and NAS, and from £1,250 + VAT for SAN and enterprise storage. Your exact price is fixed in writing after a free diagnostic, never guessed over the phone.

No. We price by the type of recovery and the work involved, not by how much data is on the device. A 500GB drive and a 4TB drive with the same fault cost the same to recover.

No, prices are shown excluding VAT, which is added at the standard UK rate. Your written quote always shows the total including VAT before you decide anything.

Yes. We assess your device at no charge, usually within 48 hours, and tell you what failed, what is recoverable and the fixed price. There is no obligation to go ahead.

The biggest factor is whether the fault is logical (deleted files, corruption, a failed array configuration) or physical (failed heads, a dead board, NAND-level work). Physical recoveries need matched donor parts and bench time, so they cost more and take a 50% deposit.

On most jobs, if we cannot recover your data you do not pay the recovery fee. The exceptions are physical drive-level repairs, CCTV/DVR and forensic work, which take significant specialist time regardless of outcome and so take a 50% deposit upfront.

// no surprises

Tell us what failed, we'll tell you the price.

Start with a free written diagnostic. We'll confirm exactly what's recoverable and what it costs — then it's your call. Drop your device off in Bristol, or post it in fully insured.

Call us — 0117 332 1137
Mon–Fri · 9am–5:30pm · No fix, no fee
Start a free diagnostic →