How to download all data from WhatsApp

Question

I don't want to make this a political or sociological discussion about Facebook or WhatsApp.For personal reasons I have decided to stop using WhatsApp.When I closed my Facebook and Instagram accounts I was able to download all my data, including messages and media.I was unable to do the same with my WhatsApp data, at least not unless I export each chat individually.Does anyone know of a way to get such data in a cohesive way for my personal archive?

throwaway568 · Accepted Answer

You can get into the iPhone or Android and copy the SQLite database to your computer.
The images can be tricky - some form of reference to the image in your phone, hard to put together; otherwise the messages in all the chats are in the database, navigable by a SQLite client.
Speaking from personal experience porting messages from iPhone to Android.

jolmg · Answer

> at least not unless I export each chat individually.Careful not to assume that works. Last time I did that some years ago, the export was missing like a year's worth of messages.

andrewshadura · Answer

I used a self-hosted WhatsApp to Matrix bridge to create a Matrix version of all chats I participated in, backfilled the history and downloaded all media.

dave_sid · Answer

Your best bet is to screenshot the messages on your phone then run them through some OCR software. A larger screen size will make this quicker.