Telegram can now import your WhatsApp chat history to iOS

Telegram added the ability to import your chat history from WhatsApp, which means you won’t lose past conversations if you want to change your messaging service. On iOS, the feature arrived with version 7.4, released yesterday and spotted by 9to5Mac, but the update does not appear to be live on Android yet. Along with WhatsApp, chat histories from Line and KakaoTalk can also be imported, according to Telegram’s changelog. We have verified that you can import chats from WhatsApp to the latest version (7.4.1) of Telegram and continue the conversation, as long as each WhatsApp user has a Telegram account.

The addition of the feature comes as Telegram reports huge increases in user numbers, with the service now boasting over 500 million active users worldwide. The cause appears to be WhatsApp’s new privacy policy, which sparked privacy concerns over the Facebook-owned messaging app (WhatsApp later delayed the introduction of the new policy and insisted that it will not affect the security of consumer conversations or profile data). For users switching from WhatsApp to Telegram, being able to take their chat history with them means one less barrier to switching.

Screenshot: Telegram

The import process works on a chat-by-chat basis, but seems to work for both individual and group conversations, at least with WhatsApp. To import a chat from Facebook’s messaging service, open the appropriate chat and tap the group or contact name at the top of the chat to open its info screen. From there, the ‘Export Chat’ option opens the iOS Share Sheet, where you will see the option to select Telegram. Then just choose a Telegram chat to import the messages into.

All messages imported into chats have a small “Imported” label on them indicating when they were originally sent, and when they were imported into Telegram, and the messages are visible to all chat participants. You have the option to import WhatsApp chat histories with or without their images. Imported messages appear in the order in which they were imported, rather than in the order in which they were originally sent.

Telegram’s support for imported chat histories comes along with a few other messaging service quality of life improvements, such as the ability to adjust volumes for individual voice chat participants or reporting “bogus groups.” or channels ”that attempt to impersonate famous people or organizations.