---
title: Saves
description: Where Empo keeps your save files, what happens to them when you update or delete a game, and how to move saves in and out.
sidebar:
  icon: save
---

Empo keeps saves in the Files app, under **On My iPhone → Empo**. Nothing is hidden inside the
app binary, so an app update never touches a save.

## Where a save lives

A game writes its saves in one of two places. The game decides, not Empo.

| Location                  | Path in Files                   | Which games                                                    |
| ------------------------- | ------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------- |
| The shared data folder    | `Empo/Data/<game>/`             | Most games. The engine sends saves there, as desktop mkxp-z does. |
| Inside the game folder    | `Empo/Games/<title>/Game/`      | Games that save next to their own files (`Game.rxdata`, a `Save Data/` folder). Empo calls these portable saves. |

Two versions of a game that declare the same data path share one folder under `Data/`. That is
how a fangame keeps its saves from one release to the next.

To see where one game saves, play it, save once, and look for the newest file under both paths.

## When you update a game

An import over an installed game merges the new files into the game folder. Your saves stay.
If the new version ships a file at the path of one of your saves, the newer file keeps the path,
and Empo keeps the other one beside it with a `.empo-displaced.bak` suffix.

The shared data folder is never part of an update.

## When you delete a game

- Saves in the shared data folder stay where they are.
- Portable saves move to `Empo/Rescued Saves/<title>/`, with their folder structure intact.
- A file that Empo does not recognize as a save goes with the game.

When you import the same game again, Empo moves the rescued saves back into the game folder
before the first launch.

:::warning
If you delete Empo itself, iOS deletes the whole `Empo` folder, saves included. Update the app
over the old one. Do not delete it first.
:::

## Move saves in from another device

Copy the save files into the folder the game uses on this device.

1. **Find the folder**

    Play the game once and save, so the folder exists. Find the new file under `Empo/Data/` or
    under the game folder.

2. **Copy the files**

    In the Files app, copy your save files from the other device, from iCloud Drive, or from a
    zip, into that folder. Keep the file names. Replace the files with the same names.

3. **Restart the game**

    Quit the game if it is open, close Empo from the app switcher, and start the game again.

Saves from Windows, from desktop mkxp-z, and from JoiPlay work without a change. The file format
is the same.

## Move saves out

Copy the files out of the same folder with the Files app, or share the folder to another app.
Keep a copy of your saves before you try a game update that you do not trust.

## Saves that went missing

A defect in versions before v0.6.1 renamed the save files of some games. Empo v0.6.1 and newer
restore the newest save for each affected game at launch, and show a **Saves recovered** sheet.
The renamed copies stay in the game folder as backups.

If a save is still missing, check the other location in the table above, then check
`Rescued Saves/`. If it is in none of them, ask on [Discord](/community).