Needless to turn too much. WhatsApp is the most widely used messaging application in the world. According to data released by Zuckerberg on May 3, 2018, WhatsApp has over 1 billion users.
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It is therefore legitimate to ask questions such as “how do I save my conversations on WhatsApp?” Or, more specifically, “how can I transfer WhatsApp messages from an old smartphone to a new one“? Let’s find out how to transfer WhatsApp chats by splitting the topics into paragraphs. Yes, because many users would not only want to transfer their chat but would also like to do so by passing from iPhone to Android or vice versa, for example.
How to transfer Whatsapp messages from one smartphone to another
Let’s start with the most obvious step, or how to backup WhatsApp conversations and transfer it to the new smartphone. This operation is also useful for actually saving the chat history so as to keep it in case of problems on the current device.
- Android – Android has introduced a very useful feature that allows you to back up all the files transiting WhatsApp via Google Drive, Google’s home backup platform. Only in the WhatsApp home, press the menu button (the three vertical points) in the upper right corner, press Settings, then Chat and go to the Backup chat submenu. Here you can choose the most suitable settings for you.
- iPhone – On iOS, as well as on Android, on the other hand, we use a proprietary cloud service, which is the classic iCloud. From the WhatsApp home page, simply click on Settings (you can find it in the lower right corner), click on Chat, then on Chat backup and continue to press Backup now. Simple, isn’t it?
How not to miss the WhatsApp chats by changing phone
Now that we’ve saved our conversations on WhatsApp on the cloud, it’s time to see how to transfer chats from one device to another. More specifically, we will analyze the following topics:
- How to transfer WhatsApp chats from Android to Android
- How to transfer WhatsApp chats from iPhone to iPhone
- How to transfer WhatsApp chats from Android to iPhone (and vice versa)
- How to transfer WhatsApp chats from Windows Phone to Android
Transfer WhatsApp chat from Android to Android
Let’s start with the most popular mobile platform, Android. How do I transfer the chats on my old Android smartphone to the new one? It’s pretty simple To start the new smartphone, you need to use a SIM with the same phone number you used on the old smartphone and add the same Google account you backed up to Google Drive. The account will be added directly to the smartphone, not only to WhatsApp.
To add an account just go to Settings -> Account (on some smartphones it has different wordings, on Samsung, for example, Cloud and account) and look for the Add account button. Usually, the Add Account button is located at the bottom of the list of active accounts. Enter the login credentials and wait for the synchronization to finish. That being said, there is a series of simple steps missing:
- Install WhatsApp from the Play Store.
- Open WhatsApp ensuring you are connected to the Internet, preferably over Wi-Fi as we need to proceed with a chat reset.
- After checking your phone number, WhatsApp should automatically recognize your Google account.
As mentioned, it is better to connect to a Wi-Fi to transfer Whatsapp messages, as in addition to chats, which occupy a few MB, there are also various multimedia files such as photographs, videos or voice messages. And if for some strange reason you can’t use Google Drive backups? In theory, it is possible to transfer WhatsApp conversations from the old to the new smartphone with manual backups that are saved locally (and not on the cloud). To view these options, however, it is not necessary to activate backup via Drive, otherwise, you will not even see the option to perform this type of backup.
Transfer Whatsapp messages (without Cloud)
That said, of course, on the old smartphone, open WhatsApp, press the button with the three dots vertically at the top right, press Settings, again on Chat and again on Backup chat. Here you will find the item Backup and the option Include video. Click on Back up when you’re ready. Now you have to use any File Manager, like ES File Manager, Astro or Solid Explorer. Follow the steps below now:
- Press the menu button at the top left (similar to this symbol ≡), then press Home.
- From here scroll down to find the WhatsApp folder, open it.
- Go to the Database folder and look for the file msgstore.db.crypt8 .
- Press and hold on this file to open sharing options. You now have several options:
- Or save your cloud backup, like on Dropbox;
- Send the backup via Gmail also to your address;
- Otherwise, you save it on some kind of physical media, like the microSD to use maybe even on the new smartphone.
On the new smartphone, you must obviously install WhatsApp, a file manager (perhaps the same one used previously), recover the file you had previously saved and place it in the exact same position, ie Home WhatsApp Database. If one of the two folders did not exist, you can create them manually. Once the file is placed in the right place, open WhatsApp, check the phone number and accept to restore the backup that the smartphone will automatically find.
Transfer Whatsapp messages from iPhone to iPhone
We come now to the transfer of messages from the old iPhone to the new iPhone. As anticipated, we will use iCloud, Apple’s cloud storage service. We already said at the beginning of the guide what to do on the old iPhone. When you have verified that WhatsApp has actually made the backup, remove the SIM from the old iPhone and insert it into the new one. Also, make sure in this case that you have Wi-Fi available for recovery without consuming all your data.
On your new iPhone be sure to log in with the same Apple ID used on your old smartphone (Settings -> iCloud and access) and also use the same SIM or the same phone number. Download WhatsApp from the App Store and install it on your iPhone. Start, follow the phone number verification process and accept the iCloud chat recovery terms by clicking Restore chat history. Congratulations, you’re done.
Transfer Whatsapp messages from Android to iPhone
First of all- is it possible to transfer Whatsapp chats from Android to iPhone? The answer is yes”. Technically it would not be possible. On the two platforms, WhatsApp uses different online storage techniques. Even the files saved in the local backup would be different. So why did we say “yes” and not directly? Because there are alternative methods made by multiple nerd users.
WazzapMigrator
The correct name of the application is WazzapMigrator, it doesn’t use the name of WhatsApp for the simple reason that it would be easier to find. This is a paid application that, however, according to what is reported in the comments on the Play Store, does its dirty work. With this, we’re telling you that we haven’t personally tested it.
The application is updated to support the Galaxy S8’s extended screen mode, but costs € 3.79. If it can help you transfer Whatsapp messages it could be worth it.
Once this file is extracted and saved, simply copy it to your Android device (via cloud, email, microSD) in one of these two folders. So, just download WazzapMigrator, and the app itself will do the dirty work for you.
Transfer Whatsapp messages from Android to iPhone
As in the opposite case, also in this, the answer is “Yes”. Technically it cannot be done for the same reasons- different files, different cloud saving systems. However, there is a rather expensive PC program that could help you.
WhatsApp Transfer
It is a tool that, at least on paper, is really powerful. It could also help you in the opposite case, or transfer chats from iPhone to Android. However, we usually do not recommend using these tools. First of all, we don’t know what the level of support provided by the developers is. Recently Apple has changed the encryption technique of files stored on iTunes and some program procedures do not work properly. Secondly, because, as anticipated, it is quite expensive. From the official website of WhatsApp Transfer. You can download a demo for Windows or MacOS, but a personal license costs more than € 30.
Transfer Whatsapp messages from Windows Phone to Android
Is it possible to transfer WhatsApp chats from Windows Phone to Android? Unfortunately, the answer to this question is no. Also in the frequently asked questions on WhatsApp. It specifies that it is possible to make transfers only from devices of the same family. If Google’s search was done by recalling this official Microsoft topic, unfortunately, as reported in the second answer, it is “wrong”, or rather, it is a matter of transferring the chat but from one Windows Phone to another.
Transfer Chat WhatsApp to PC
We have already discussed this topic in our guide for implementing WhatsApp chat backups. Basically, you can send your conversations via e-mail and read them comfortably on your PC.
