Your Old WhatsApp Data Might Soon be Deleted: Here is How to Back up And Retain it

While most of WhatsApp's media files and messages are unaffected by the updates that the chat platform brings to its users, the story might be a little different with an upcoming WhatsApp update. As per a recent post by the Facebook-owned chat app, the company has got into an agreement with Google wherein from November 12 onwards, the backups made by a user of their WhatsApp data will not be counted towards the quota of their Google Drive storage. "Starting November 12, 2018, WhatsApp backups will no longer count towards the Google Drive storage quota," reads an FAQ page of the company.

While this is a welcoming move for all the cloud storage users, an underlying point of concern is what the post mentions further. "WhatsApp backups that haven't been updated in more than one year will be automatically removed from Google Drive storage," essentially meaning that WhatsApp users might lose their data if it has not been backed up on the drive for more than a year. This data will include chats as well as the media files that the users have transferred through WhatsApp.

How to save your data from being deleted?

Since most of the users have been using WhatsApp for more than a year, there is bound to be a certain amount of data which might go under the scanner post the mentioned date. So in case that data is valuable for you and you would like to hold on to it for long, WhatsApp recommends its users to "manually backup" the data before November 12, 2018.

Here is how to do the same:

1. Open 'Settings' through the three dot icon on the top right. Select 'Chats'.

2. Open 'Chat Backup'. The window will show you your last back up date and time. In case it is a way too old one, select 'Back Up' to manually back up your data to your Google Drive storage.

3. It is also recommended to change your 'Google Drive Settings' below it, switching to an automatic time period of 'Back up to Google Drive' as per your preference or choosing whether you want to include videos to your chat backup.

Note: You should use a Wi-Fi connection to back up your WhatsApp data lest the size of the back up is too large.