Community Edition Data recovery

[saikrishna1020]

I was using Databricks Community Edition for some practice work, and I had created a few notebooks as part of my learning. However, when I recently tried to log in, I received a message saying, "We were not able to find a Community Edition." Now, none of my previous notebooks or data are visible in my account.

Unfortunately, it seems like all of my data, including the notebooks, is no longer accessible. I would appreciate any support or guidance you can provide to help recover the lost data, if possible.

Thank you for your time and support.

[Brahmareddy]

Hi saikrishna1020,

How are you doing today? I totally understand how upsetting it can be to lose work you’ve put effort into. With Databricks Community Edition, unfortunately, inactivity for an extended period (usually 14–30 days) can cause the workspace to be deactivated or automatically deleted, including all files, notebooks, and data stored within it. Since Community Edition is a free offering, it doesn’t include persistent storage or support like the paid tiers.

If you’re seeing the message “We were not able to find a Community Edition,” it usually means your workspace was deprovisioned. Sadly, there’s no official recovery process for deleted data in Community Edition unless you had previously exported your notebooks manually.

For future use, I’d recommend regularly exporting your notebooks as .dbc or .ipynb files and saving them locally or on GitHub. And if you're planning to continue working with Databricks more seriously, even the 14-day trial of the Premium tier or a small paid plan on Azure/AWS gives you more stability and support.

Regards,

Brahma