WhatsApp is a popular messaging app and almost everyone with a smartphone uses it. The Facebook-owned messaging app has over 1.5 billion monthly active users globally.
WhatsApp is a feature-packed application and new features are added to the app regularly. One of its basic features is its ability to clear all messages, whether it is private messages or group messages at once.
It is easy to clear all the messages at once, without having to select messages one by one. However, you may have accidentally deleted some important messages and now want to recover them.
Today, we will look at ways to restore deleted WhatsApp messages for Android and iOS users. We will use the most recent backup to restore messages on WhatsApp. It is to be noted that you will lose messages that were received after your last backup. WhatsApp allows you to delete any chat or message on the online messaging platform.
If you delete an important WhatsApp message or chat by accident or lose it inadvertently when resetting or changing your device don’t worry you won’t lose those messages forever & there is an option to recover them.
From Google Drive
When retrieving deleted WhatsApp chat messages from Google Drive, you need to ensure that you’re using the same phone number and Google account used to create the backup.
Here’s how you can recover WhatsApp chat backup from Google Drive on Android:
1. Uninstall WhatsApp from your Android device and then, reinstall.
2. Now, open the app and enter your registered WhatsApp number to sign in. Type in the OTP received on the same number for verification.
3. Post verification, you’ll get a prompt to restore your chat backup from Google Drive. Tap on Restore to initiate the recovery process.
4. Once the initialisation is complete, tap on Next to find all your chats.
WhatsApp will continue to download media files including photos, videos, documents and more on your Android smartphone in the background.
From Local Backup
If you don’t have your chat history backed up on Google Drive, WhatsApp will automatically pull the same from your local backup file.
You’ll need to transfer the backup WhatsApp files to your Android phone using a file explorer, computer or SD card. Follow these steps:
1.Download a file manager app on your Android phone or open the one that already comes pre-installed with your device, if any.
2.In the app, navigate to the /sdcard/WhatsApp/Databases or Android/media/com.whatsapp/WhatsApp/Backups for Android 12 and above devices.
3.From the list of backup files, copy the most recent one and paste it in the Databases folder in the internal storage of your existing or new device.
4. Now, uninstall and reinstall WhatsApp on your Android phone and log in using your registered phone number.
5. When prompted, tap the Restore option to recover all your deleted or missing chats from the local backup.
Note: Your phone’s internal storage automatically stores last seven days’ WhatsApp history in local backup files. This backup is created every day at 2.00 am and saved as a file.
How to Recover Deleted WhatsApp Chats on iPhone
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- 6. Before you go on to follow the below-mentioned steps, you need to verify that you have an iCloud backup for WhatsApp in the first place. Open WhatsApp and go to Settings > Chats > Chat Backup. If you find that the backup was performed, proceed as mentioned below:
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- 7. Uninstall WhatsApp from your iPhone by choosing Remove App > Delete App.
- 8. Now, go to the App Store and reinstall messenger on your phone. Once the installation is complete, open the app and verify your phone number.
9. Follow the prompts to recover your deleted or missing messages from iCloud.
How to Recover Deleted Media on WhatsApp
Following the above-mentioned ways to recover WhatsApp messages on Android and iOS will mostly retrieve any deleted media from your chats as well.
But if that doesn’t work, it is possible to find them either in your phone’s internal storage or on the cloud storage.
Here’s our guide on how you can recover deleted media from WhatsApp chat history:
On Android
1. Go to File Manager > WhatsApp > Media and you might find the deleted photos you want to recover in one of the folders.
2. Take a look inside your phone’s Gallery app (Albums > WhatsApp).
3. Check Google Photos if you have turned on the automatic camera upload feature.
4. If you have enabled the Save to Camera Roll feature in WhatsApp, you might find a backup copy of the deleted images in Photos app.
5. If you have enabled image backup on iCloud, you may want to check inside Camera Roll, Camera Uploads or a similar folder on the cloud.
How to Backup WhatsApp Messages
By now, you must already know that you can only restore deleted WhatsApp messages and media if you have your chats backed up on cloud storage.
Even though WhatsApp creates a local backup every night on Android devices, it won’t be of any use if you end up losing the phone.
Therefore, it is vital that you create a cloud backup on Google Drive or iCloud.
Read on to know how you can backup WhatsApp messages on Google Drive and iCloud:
On Google Drive (For Android users)
1. Open WhatsApp and tap the three-dot icon at the top-right for more options.
2. Go to Settings > Chats > Chat Backup and select Back up to Google Drive.
3. On the page that opens, select a backup frequency from Daily, Weekly or Monthly.
4. Next, choose the Google account where you’d like to back up your WhatsApp chat history (or Add account if you haven’t linked your phone to any Google account).
1. Now, select Back up over and click on the network you wish to use for backups. (It is preferable to use a stable Wi-Fi connection for backup rather than cellular data.)
2. If you wish to manually back up your WhatsApp chats to Google Drive at any time, just open the app, open the three-dot menu, and tap Settings > Chat > Chat Backup > Back up.
3. Open WhatsApp and tap the Settings tab at the bottom.
4 .Go to Chats > Chat Backup and select Auto Backup.
5. Now, select a backup frequency from Daily, Weekly or Monthly.
WhatsApp on iOS also gives you the option to include or exclude videos from the backup. It might take a while for the iCloud backup process to complete so it is better to use Wi-Fi. In case you wish to create a manual iCloud backup of your WhatsApp chats at any time, open WhatsApp, go to the Settings menu, and tap Chats > Chat Backup > Back Up Now.
Note: Every time a new backup file is created, WhatsApp deletes older backup files. Android phones store backup files for up to seven days’ while iPhone keeps only the latest one.
How to Recover Archived Chats in WhatsApp
Before we look at recovering deleted WhatsApp messages, there’s a chance that you might have just archived a missing chat, not deleted it.
But what’s the difference?
Archiving removes the chat from your list, allowing you to hide conversations that you’re done with for now.
You can unarchive a chat at any time to access it again, and archiving doesn’t delete anything in the chat.
Conversely, deleting a chat erases its contents, so they’re no longer accessible to you.
On iPhone, when you archive a chat, you can immediately reverse the archival by shaking your device and choosing Undo to recover the archived chat.
But even if you miss this, it’s easy to retrieve archived WhatsApp chats later.
To Unarchive a WhatsApp chat on iPhone
1. Scroll up in the chat list ( from top to bottom) until Archived Chats appears.
2. Tap on it, then swipe from right to left on the chat you want to restore.
3. Hit the Unarchive button that appears.
To Unarchive a chat on Android
1. Scroll to the bottom of the chat list and tap Archived chats (X).
2. Press and hold on the chat you want to recover.
3. Tap the unarchive icon at the top-right, which looks like a box with an upward-facing arrow.
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