IOS – iPhone SE on iOS 9 – Possible to restore messages from an iOS 10 backup

Ok I did it with iPhone Back Extractor. Lucky me the first note was that I needed

Download the free edition here: http://www.iphonebackupextractor.com/free-download/

It will locate automatically your backup folder otherwise you can select it manually, then select what you want to extract.

So, download the app, run it and then select your backup, if it has not been already found by the application itself. Then, the simplest way is to click the blue number next to 'Notes' in the available data section. You can also extract your Notes to .HTML format using the 'Extract' menu and choosing 'Notes as HTML'. You can do that for contacts, photos, calendar, location data, call history and so on.

I had the same issue (I use iTunes on Windows 7). I Bought a new iPhone 5 and used the Backup / Restore method to move my stuff from the old iPhone 4S to the new one. The process only restored all the Apple apps, plus Contacts, Phone Calls, and Messages. When I tried to backup again - hoping it would restore the rest - it went through a restore process in iTunes (for about 5 minutes) and then I got the message that my iPhone will restart but never did (I had to restart it manually).

What I also noticed was that, when I retried, the Backup seemed to be very quick.

I called Apple Support who said that there is a problem with the Backup process. I would be able to restore my Apps via the Purchased Apps process but I would lose all my user data (such as games progress). I was extremely frustrated because I use my iPhone and iPad as tools, not game devices.

I went to the App Store on the iPhone and started downloading some of the Purchased apps from the what seemed to be the iCloud. To my surprise, all app data was there (eg. WhatsApp chats, and The Vault data). I am not sure how this works because I never deliberatelly setup app backup on the cloud, but I suspect that the "Documents and Data" == "On" setting on Settings --> iCloud does exactly that, and in return does not include this information on the PC backup.

All seems fine now (at least for the apps for which I care and tried). The issue I still have is this uncertainty on what exactly is my iPhone doing and where is my stuff at any point in time.