Important: Private channels cannot be restored back into Teams as of 8 September 2025. Private channel messages can only be restored as JSON files using InstantData. Private channel files can be restored using InstantData or using SharePoint as in the workaround described below.
Background
When a new Team is created in Teams, a linked SharePoint site of the same name is automatically created. When a user creates a private channel or shared channel within that Team, however, a different site named {team name}-{channel name} is created in SharePoint. This is a Microsoft security measure to prevent any user who is a member of the Team but not of the private or shared channel from accessing the files contained in the channel's Files tab.
Because we backup Teams based on their linked SharePoint sites, this security measure means that the Files tabs of private or shared channels cannot be restored into a Teams instance. These files can only be restored locally using InstantData, or as SharePoint files if you have SharePoint backup, as described below.
Files in standard Teams channels are not subject to this Microsoft security measure and can be restored into a Teams instance. For more information on the different types of channels, see this article from Microsoft's knowledge base: Standard, private, or shared channels in Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Support
Private channels should not be confused with private chats (direct messages), which are not currently supported for any type of recovery.
Workaround
Private or shared channel files are not restorable back into Teams (New folder restore), but can be restored via InstantData, or as SharePoint files if the SharePoint site linked to that channel is backed up. If you do not make use of SharePoint backup, we recommend adding this service if your organisation needs to be able to restore files from private or shared channels.
In order to have the option to restore files, you will need to manually add the the relevant channel SharePoint sites to the SharePoint backup set.
To do this:
1. In the RedApp, open the SharePoint backup set and confirm that a site named {team}-{channel} is in the account list. If it is not, the files were never backed up and only messages are recoverable.
2. Also in the RedApp, confirm the Teams backup set covers the team you want to restore, i.e. with a backup date from before the channel was deleted.
3. In Teams, create a new channel in the target team and set its type to Private.
4. Give this cannel a new name. Never use the original, as Microsoft blocks reuse of channel names even after deletion.
5. Open InstantData on the Teams backup set. Go into the channel and read the channel metadata file to get the original member list.
- You can find the member list under 1_Channels/<Channel-GUID>/channelsettings.json (this contains a members array with different data like ID, displayName, email, etc.).
6. Add the members to the new private channel.
7. Open InstantData on the SharePoint backup set. Select the {team}-{channel} site and the right backup date.
8. Download that site's document library contents to a local folder.
- You can find the library contents under {team}-{channel}/Shared Documents.
9. Upload the library contents into the Files tab of the new private channel in Teams.
10. Open InstantData on the Teams backup set again and export the channel messages. These will be exported as a JSON file.
- You can find the messages list under 1_Channels/<Channel-GUID>/Messages (one file per message).
11. Convert the exported JSON file to Word or PDF, then paste the contents into the new channel.
12. Add the new channel's site, {team}-{new name}, to the SharePoint backup set.
Note: Do not run a Teams restore to fix this. A restore will create a new team, rebuild every channel in the backup (regardless of what you selected to restore), skips private channels, and recreates shared channels as standard and visible (only the folder structure).
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