When you archive text message conversations on your phone, you may be wondering if you can still access those messages later if needed. The short answer is yes, archived messages are still available and can be unarchived. Here’s a more in-depth look at how text message archiving works and how to retrieve old messages.
What Happens When You Archive Text Messages?
Archiving a text message conversation on your phone doesn’t delete the messages – it just removes the thread from your main messages inbox. Archived messages are still stored on your device or in your cloud backups. The main effects of archiving conversations are:
- The conversation disappears from your Messages list.
- You no longer get notifications for new incoming messages in that thread.
- The conversation becomes muted.
Other than that, your archived messages remain intact and accessible. You just have to take a couple extra steps to view them compared to normal threads.
Where Are Archived Texts Stored?
Where archived messages are saved depends on your device type and settings:
- iPhone – Archived iMessages are still kept in the Messages app. They can be found in a separate Archived list. Old SMS/MMS messages may be saved in your iCloud backup.
- Android – Archived texts remain in the Messages app, but appear in the Archived folder. They may also be saved in your Google Drive backup.
- Other Devices – On other phones, archived messages likely remain on your device’s internal storage or a synced cloud backup.
As long as you don’t manually delete a conversation before archiving, the full history should remain accessible.
How to View Archived Text Messages
It’s easy to find and open your archived text messages on both iPhones and Android phones.
On an iPhone
- Open the Messages app.
- Tap on the Archived button or tab – it appears along the top of your messages next to inboxes like Texts and All iMessages.
- Tap on a conversation to open it and view all archived messages.
Once opened, you can scroll through the message history, search for keywords, copy text, forward messages and more – just like with an unarchived thread.
On Android Phones
- Launch the Messages or Messaging app.
- Tap the menu button (3 vertical dots or 3 horizontal lines).
- Tap Archived conversations or Archived messages.
- Select a conversation to open it.
Archived Android messages also retain full functionality for reading, sharing, deleting, etc.
How to Unarchive Conversations
Once you’ve found your archived text history, you may want to unarchive select conversations to access them more readily. Here’s how to unarchive on both major mobile platforms:
On an iPhone
- Go to the Archived messages list in the Messages app.
- Swipe left on a conversation and tap Unarchive.
- The thread will reappear in your main Messages inbox.
On Android
- Open the Archived conversations list.
- Press and hold a conversation.
- Tap Unarchive in the menu that appears.
- The conversation will now show up in your primary Messages list again.
You can unarchive as many conversations as you want. Any new messages will resume coming in as notifications.
Can You Recover Deleted Archived Messages?
If you archived a conversation but then deleted it before unarchiving, is it gone for good? Not necessarily!
Since archived messages get saved to your device storage or cloud backups, you may be able to restore them using data recovery tools or cloud backup extracts. However, messaging apps themselves provide no built-in way to retrieve deleted archived threads.
Your options to try recovering deleted archived texts include:
- iPhone data recovery software (to pull lost messages from a local backup)
- Android SMS recovery apps
- Restoring an iCloud or Google Drive backup to a point before deletion
- Checking any synced services like WhatsApp or Telegram cloud saves
Success will depend on when backups were made relative to when the conversation was deleted. But in many cases, deep digging can resurrect archived messages that were accidentally removed.
Alternative Ways to Store Old Text Messages
Beyond archiving conversations, there are a couple other good ways to save important text message history for the long term:
- Backups – Regularly backing up your iPhone and making Android data backups will preserve texts in case you ever need to restore your device.
- Exporting – On iPhone and Android, you can export entire conversations as text files or PDFs to store offline for easy access later.
- Cloud sync – Services like iCloud, Google Drive, and third-party apps can also create cloud copies of texts for safe keeping.
Key Takeaways
- Archiving messages removes conversations from your inbox but retains the history on your device or cloud backups.
- You can view archived messages by navigating to the Archived folder in your messaging app.
- Unarchiving brings conversations back to your main messages list.
- With extra effort, you may be able to recover even deleted archived messages from backups.
- Backing up your texts regularly provides an alternate way to preserve important message history.
Conclusion
Archiving text messages doesn’t delete them – it just organizes your inbox by removing stale conversations. Your full message history remains accessible in the archived folder. While archived conversations are meant for older texts you don’t need ready access to, you can still easily view, unarchive or forward archived messages when needed. So feel free to archive old threads to clean up your messaging interface without worrying about losing your message history.
