Export a WhatsApp chat

On iPhone and on Android, WhatsApp will hand you an entire conversation as a plain text file. Here is where the button hides, what the file really holds, and what it leaves out.

What an export really contains

A WhatsApp export is not a backup. It is a text file, usually named _chat.txt, with one line per message: date, time, author, text. Nothing more, and that is exactly what makes it useful.

On Android, a conversation looks like this:

22/07/2023, 11:59 - Maxime: Morning everyone
22/07/2023, 12:27 - Ines: <Media omitted>
22/07/2023, 12:57 - Jonas: what time are we leaving?

On iPhone it is the same thing, with the date in brackets:

[22.07.2023 11:59:32] Maxime: Morning everyone
[22.07.2023 12:27:04] Ines: <Media omitted>

The two formats carry the same information. It makes no difference which phone produced the file.

Three things are in there too, and they often come as a surprise:

• deleted messages, as a line reading "This message was deleted". The line stays, the original text is gone.
• calls and polls, each summarised in a single line.
• system lines: group creation, name changes, people joining and leaving, and the encryption notice sitting on the very first line.

And one thing is not: reactions. The emoji stuck under a message are never exported.

Exporting from an iPhone

1. Open the chat or the group.
2. Tap the contact or group name at the very top of the screen.
3. Scroll to the bottom of the info screen, down to "Export Chat".
4. Choose "Without Media".
5. The share sheet opens. "Save to Files" puts the file on the phone, "Mail" sends it straight to you.

Exporting from Android

1. Open the chat or the group.
2. Open the menu, the three dots at the top right.
3. "More", then "Export chat".
4. Choose "Without media".
5. Pick where it goes: your mail app, Drive, or a file manager.

With or without media

Without media produces a light .txt file, often a few hundred kilobytes, holding the complete text. This is the right choice almost every time.

With media produces a .zip archive carrying photos, videos and voice messages. It gets very heavy very quickly, and WhatsApp compensates by cutting off far earlier in the history: you gain the pictures, you lose the years.

Getting the file onto a computer

The export always starts on the phone. WhatsApp Web and the desktop app do not offer this button, which is the source of just about every fruitless search on the subject.

Three routes work, easiest first:

• Mail it to yourself from the share sheet, then open your inbox on the computer. Fastest, and it works on both systems.
• Go through Files or Drive, then pick the file up from the same account on the computer.
• AirDrop from iPhone to a Mac, or a USB cable from Android.

The limits worth knowing

WhatsApp caps its exports, and the cap drops a great deal lower as soon as you take the media along. Beyond it the export still goes through, but it starts later in time: the oldest messages are dropped, silently, without any warning.

This is the main reason an export "does not go back far enough". If that happens to you, do it again without the media: the same group will often reach several years further back.

Finally, the export reflects what your phone keeps. If you joined the group in 2024, the 2021 history exists only for the people who were already there.

What you can do with it

A flat, dated file lends itself to a lot: finding an address someone sent three years ago, archiving a group before you leave it, counting who writes the most, or making a keepsake for the group.

The .zip can be dropped in as it is, no need to unzip it, and so can the .txt. You need a group of at least three people for the ceremony to have anything to work with.

Frequently asked questions