# Chat history gone after PC restart — agent-transcripts files emptied; how to recover?

**URL:** <https://forum.cursor.com/t/chat-history-gone-after-pc-restart-agent-transcripts-files-emptied-how-to-recover/158251>\
**Category:** Bug Reports\
**Tags:** windows, chat\
**Created:** [April 17, 2026, 3:23am UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/chat-history-gone-after-pc-restart-agent-transcripts-files-emptied-how-to-recover/158251 "2026-04-17T03:23:27Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Yusufu\_Sha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/aca169/32.png) [@Yusufu\_Sha](https://forum.cursor.com/u/Yusufu_Sha)\
**Post date:** [April 17, 2026, 3:23am UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/chat-history-gone-after-pc-restart-agent-transcripts-files-emptied-how-to-recover/158251/1 "2026-04-17T03:23:27Z")

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### Where does the bug appear (feature/product)?

Cursor IDE

### Describe the Bug

On Windows, after a slow machine and a full restart, some Cursor chat history disappeared. In %USERPROFILE%.cursor\projects\<project\>\agent-transcripts\<chat-id\>, the id folder still exists, but the .jsonl files for that day(which I reboot pc) are missing . Could you clarify where chats are stored, what can cause transcript files to be cleared, and whether there is any supported recovery path (local backup, sync, or otherwise)?

### Steps to Reproduce

1. After using Cursor IDE some days, quit Cursor IDE and reboot.
2. Open IDE and found not chat history in Chat Panel.

Not consistently reproducible.

### Expected Behavior

I’d like to recover my chat history.

### Operating System

Linux

### Version Information

Version: 2.5.25 (system setup)  
VSCode Version: 1.105.1  
Commit: 7150844152b426ed50d2b68dd6b33b5c5beb73c0  
Date: 2026-02-24T07:17:49.417Z  
Build Type: Stable  
Release Track: Default  
Electron: 39.4.0  
Chromium: 142.0.7444.265  
Node.js: 22.22.0  
V8: 14.2.231.22-electron.0  
OS: Windows\_NT x64 10.0.26200

### Does this stop you from using Cursor

No - Cursor works, but with this issue

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![deanrie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/cursor1/user_avatar/forum.cursor.com/deanrie/32/1263_2.png) [@deanrie](https://forum.cursor.com/u/deanrie)\
**Post date:** [April 17, 2026, 5:19am UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/chat-history-gone-after-pc-restart-agent-transcripts-files-emptied-how-to-recover/158251/5 "2026-04-17T05:19:16Z")

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Hey, this is a known issue. A few users have reported losing chat history after a reboot. More details here: [Disappearing chat history](https://forum.cursor.com/t/disappearing-chat-history/155244)

Quick answers to your requests:

Where chats are stored: Transcripts are stored locally in `%USERPROFILE%\.cursor\projects\<project>\agent-transcripts\`, and chat metadata is in `state.vscdb`. There is no server copy.

Why the files disappeared: Writing transcripts to disk is not atomic. If the machine was slow and rebooted during a write, the files could end up empty or be lost.

Recovery: Unfortunately, there is no supported way to recover lost transcripts. The data is fully local and is not synced to any server.

One more thing. You’re on version 2.5.25 (Feb 2026), which is fairly old. Since then, chat persistence has been improved. I’d recommend updating to the latest version to reduce the chance of this happening again.

The team is aware of the issue, and your report helps us prioritize it.

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**Author:** ![system](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/cursor1/user_avatar/forum.cursor.com/system/32/99069_2.png) [@system](https://forum.cursor.com/u/system)\
**Post date:** [May 9, 2026, 5:20am UTC](https://forum.cursor.com/t/chat-history-gone-after-pc-restart-agent-transcripts-files-emptied-how-to-recover/158251/6 "2026-05-09T05:20:05Z")

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Closed on May 9, 2026, 5:20am UTC

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