SignalSep 8, 2025

Until now, if you lost or broke your phone, your Signal message history was gone, a real challenge for everyone whose most important conversations happen in Signal. So, with careful design & development, we’re rolling out opt-in secure backups.

Secure backups will let you save an archive of your Signal messages remotely in privacy-preserving form, refreshed daily.

Now available in the latest Android beta release, rolling out to iOS & Desktop soon

https://signal.org/blog/introducing-secure-backups/

Introducing Signal Secure Backups

In the past, if you broke or lost your phone, your Signal message history was gone. This has been a challenge for people whose most important conversations happen on Signal. Think family photos, sweet messages, important documents, or anything else you don’t want to lose forever. This explains wh...

Signal Messenger
Show threadShannon ClarkSep 8, 2025

@signalapp would this also work for the use case of upgrading a phone (where you want continuity of your message/media history?)

Or do you already have a process for that? (I haven't replaced my phone in years - but plan on doing so soon - and retaining my signal groups etc on my new phone is a key feature I need and assume there is a method to do that)

(I'm on iOS if it matters)

Show threadRoelandDeVries
@Rycaut @signalapp that has already been possible for a long time on iOS, as long as you have access to Signal on your current phone: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059752-Backup-and-Restore-Messages#ios_requirements
Backup and Restore Messages

Signal messages, pictures, files, and other contents are stored locally on your device. If you have your old device, select the platform to transfer messages: Android iOS Desktop Message restora...

Signal Support
Sep 8, 2025 at 4:39pmWeb
Show threadShannon ClarkSep 8, 2025

@RoelandDeVries @signalapp good to know! As I mentioned been a while since I upgraded my phone so hadn't encountered this feature yet.

(though it looks like that support page will need to be updated as the new Backup feature roles out to iOS as it now has slightly inaccurate information about backups - currently still true for iOS devices but sounds like it won't be for long)