Losing important WhatsApp messages can be frustrating. It could be that you deleted an important chat by accident, or that your phone was broken or stolen and you lost all of your data. Problems can occur if, for whatever reason, those messages are no longer available.
Luckily, there are ways to maybe recover deleted WhatsApp messages if you follow the right methods. You can restore chats on both Android and iOS smartphones with in-built features and third-party apps.
How WhatsApp Manages Chat Backups
It would be helpful to know how WhatsApp manages backups so you can restore lost data. WhatsApp will save you any media or conversations you have on the cloud. If you use Google Drive, your backups will be saved in your Google Drive account. All of them are saved to iCloud on iOS devices.
Configure WhatsApp to back up conversations every day, every week, every month, or never. If you back up more often, you’ll have more restore points to choose from if you need to restore data. Note that more frequent backups will increase the amount of space required by the cloud.
How to Restore Lost WhatsApp Messages on Android
If you are using WhatsApp on an Android phone and need to find the missing messages, here are the steps to follow:
- Uninstall and reinstall WhatsApp
- When prompted, restore your chat history from Google Drive backup
- Select the most recent backup when given the option
It will overwrite your current WhatsApp install with the latest data from your backup. So any messages exchanged between the last backup and when you lost data should be restored.
If even your most recent backup does not contain the lost messages you need, you still have another option. Android stores local WhatsApp backups in device storage that you may be able to access with file manager apps.
How to Restore Lost WhatsApp Messages on iOS
For iPhone users, the process to restore data from an iCloud backup is the same:
- Delete and re-download WhatsApp
- Tap ‘Restore’ when prompted and select the desired backup
However, one key difference with iOS is that local backups are not kept on the device. If your iCloud backup does not contain the messages you need, you have fewer routes to try recovering that data.
Conclusion
Losing important WhatsApp messages can disrupt your life or work. But in many cases, this data can be recovered through existing backups. Now that you know the basics of how WhatsApp manages chat history and the steps to restore data on both major mobile platforms, you can take action if you ever suffer data loss.
Be proactive by enabling WhatsApp backups and verifying they are working properly. Check that you have enough cloud storage space for frequent backups. If you do lose vital messages, don’t hesitate to work through the restoration process outlined here. With some effort, those vanished conversations don’t have to be gone forever.