Moving WhatsApp to a new smartphone should be even easier in the future. Messenger has rolled out a new function especially for this, with which chats can be transferred from the Internet to the new device even without a backup.
If you wanted to take your existing WhatsApp chat histories with you when you changed your smartphone, you had to save them in the cloud and later load them onto the new device from there. However, a new function now makes the detour via the cloud superfluous. Alternatively, you can use it to send WhatsApp chats from one smartphone to another via a QR code.
New method saves chat backup to the cloud
Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg himself teased the new feature via Facebook. In a short video, he demonstrates the transfer of WhatsApp chats using a QR code. “If you want to transfer your WhatsApp chats to a new smartphone, you can now do so more privately without your chats ever leaving your device,” Zuckerberg said. And in fact, there is no need to upload to an external platform such as Google Drive or Apple’s iCloud. The free cloud storage for both services is limited, which means that users can reach capacity limits if they want to save an extensive backup.
Instead of using the Internet and the cloud, the data transmission of the WhatsApp chats works with the QR code method via WiFi Direct, whereby the transmission is fully encrypted according to Meta. The data thus remains with the user and is only exchanged between the two connected devices.
This is how WhatsApp chat transfer via QR code works
To transfer WhatsApp chats to a new smartphone via QR code, users proceed as follows:
- Launch WhatsApp on the old smartphone. Now open the settings with the symbol with the three dots and navigate to the item “Chats”.
- Here you will find the item “Transfer chats”. If you click on it, the transfer process can be started in the next step.
- You will now be prompted to allow access to nearby WiFi devices. Once this is done, a scanner opens with which the QR code can be scanned on the new smartphone. The QR code is automatically displayed when setting up WhatsApp on a new smartphone as an alternative to the previous backup transfer. Finally, confirm the transfer of the WhatsApp chats on the new device, done.
Depending on the size of the WhatsApp data, the chat transfer between the devices can take a few minutes. During this time, users should not leave the display screen.
However, the new feature still has a catch. So far, WhatsApp chats can only be transferred via QR code within one operating system. That is, the method only works from one Android smartphone to another or from one iPhone to another.
TECHBOOK means
“It’s always good when applications are enhanced with new functions. Until now, WhatsApp has only had one method of transferring chats when changing devices. With the QR code, users now not only have an alternative to the cloud solution, they also save themselves the backup on the Internet. This is a good thing, especially in terms of data protection, since you no longer have to upload your chats to an external service. However, it would be even nicer if the transfer would also work between different systems, i.e. Android to iOS or vice versa. Unfortunately, the process is still a bit more complicated here.” – Rita Deutschbein, Editor-in-Chief