How to keep your text messages when you switch phones

Before you erase an old phone, check that the conversations you want to keep are present on the new one. Transfer support depends on your devices, settings and the method you choose.

iPhone to iPhone

This case is well handled. Quick Start (holding the new phone near the old one during setup) or restoring from an iCloud or Finder backup will bring your messages across.

Two things to check first:

• If you use Messages in iCloud, make sure the old phone has finished syncing before you wipe it. Settings › your name › iCloud › Messages, and give it time on Wi-Fi.
• If you do not use Messages in iCloud, your messages travel inside the backup, so make sure the backup is recent. An iCloud backup that failed three weeks ago because storage was full is the classic way to lose three weeks.

Do not wipe the old phone until you have opened the new one and read an old conversation on it. Not until the transfer says it finished. Until you have actually looked.

iPhone to Android

Message history can transfer from iPhone to Android. Google’s transfer guide lists messages as supported by the classic cable process and by the upgraded process on eligible devices. The classic wireless Android Switch process does not include messages. Follow the instructions for your new phone, then check important conversations and attachments before erasing the old one.

You also need to deregister iMessage, or messages sent to your number from iPhone users will keep going into iMessage and never reach your Android phone. Apple has a deregistration page for when you no longer have the iPhone.

An export is optional. It gives you a separate, readable archive of selected conversations, useful if you want to keep them outside the new phone’s messaging app. Create and check that archive while you still have access to the messages.

Android to iPhone

Apple’s Move to iOS app transfers SMS and MMS. WhatsApp has its own official transfer path. Other messaging apps vary, and most need their own in-app backup turned on before the switch.

The step to take before any switch

Whatever direction you are going, do this while you still have the old phone working:

1. Make a backup using the method supported by your old phone. For an iPhone on a Mac: connect the iPhone, open Finder, select it, then choose Back Up Now. For an Android phone, follow its maker’s backup instructions. Check that the backup includes the messages you need.
2. Export the conversations you actually care about. Not all of them. The ones you would be upset to lose: a parent, a partner, a friend who died, the thread where something important was agreed.
3. Copy that export somewhere else. An external disk, another computer, cloud storage of your choosing. One copy is not a copy.

Check what the backup contains. Apple says computer backups exclude data already synced and stored in iCloud, including messages. A Finder backup is not a guarantee that all your conversations are inside it. If you use Messages in iCloud, check the history available in Messages on your Mac before exporting.

Why a backup alone is not enough here

A backup is useful for restoring a device. A tool that supports device backups, including Message Album, can also extract conversations that the backup actually contains without restoring an iPhone. Messages stored only in iCloud may be absent, so inspect the backup instead of assuming that it includes every conversation.

An export is different. It is a readable folder that opens in a browser on any operating system, with the attachments in it at original quality. It does not care what phone you own.

If you have already switched and wiped

Check, in this order:

1. An old local backup on your computer. Look in ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup on a Mac. People forget these exist, and they are readable with an export tool that supports device backups. If you find one, you may be fine.
2. Messages in iCloud with the old Apple ID. If the account is still yours and sync was on, signing in on a Mac may bring the history back down.
3. The other person. Unglamorous, but if the conversation matters, they may still have their side of it, and a screenshot of their thread is better than nothing.

If none of those work, the history is likely gone. Which is the argument for doing this before the switch rather than after it.

How to export an iMessage conversation on a Mac covers how, including exporting from a device backup.