Move your WhatsApp between Android and iPhone. Both ways.
Your chats, groups, and media — carried across, on your own machine. No cloud, no account, no factory reset. The first free, open-source tool built to do it in both directions.
Early development (pre-alpha) — building in the open. Watch the repo to follow along.
Why it exists
Moving WhatsApp between platforms is deliberately hard — and every existing option has a catch.
| Option | Both ways | Keeps media | Free | Open source | No reset |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Official "Move to iOS / Android" | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ setup-only |
| Paid tools ($30–70) | ✓ | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Other open-source tools | one way | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| WaTransfer | ✓ | ✓ goal | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
In plain words
Your messages sit on your phone locked up — think of a diary written in a code only your phone knows how to read. Moving them to a new phone means getting that diary out, translating it, and putting it into the new one. WaTransfer does all of that on your own computer.
First it copies the locked diary off your old phone and unlocks it with the key WhatsApp shows you. Then it rewrites the whole thing — your messages, your groups, your photos and voice notes — the way the new phone expects, because Android and iPhone don't store chats the same way. Last, it hands the rewritten diary to the new phone through the ordinary backup system that phone already uses.
A few things worth knowing, since it's your data: your old phone is only ever read from, never changed, so nothing is lost if you stop partway. Nothing gets uploaded anywhere — your messages never leave your computer, and there's no account to make. And when the new phone restarts at the very end, that's normal; it's just saving everything into place.
You don't have to take our word for any of it. The whole thing is open for anyone to read, so you — or a friend who knows this stuff — can check exactly what it does with your chats.
How it actually works
A desktop app: a friendly wizard on top of an engine that does the device and database work. Every transfer is three stages, and the same pipeline runs in both directions.
Extract — read it off the source phone
Over a USB cable, WaTransfer copies your chat database and media, then decrypts the database with your WhatsApp key. Your old phone is only ever read — never changed.
Convert — translate between the two formats
Android and iPhone store chats completely differently (msgstore.db vs a Core Data ChatStorage.sqlite). WaTransfer rewrites every message, group, and timestamp into the other phone's format.
Inject — put it on the new phone
It writes the converted chats in through the phone's own backup-and-restore system. The receiving phone restarts once to apply it — that's expected, and it's how the transfer finishes. No jailbreak, no root.
The one thing to set up first: WaTransfer decrypts your backup offline, so it needs WhatsApp's real 64-digit encryption key. In WhatsApp, turn on end-to-end encrypted backup and choose "Use 64-digit encryption key" — not a password. (A password only unlocks the key through WhatsApp's servers; no offline tool can turn a password into the key.) Then run a backup, and you're set.
Not into the technical bits? Let your AI do it
Copy the prompt below and paste it into your own AI assistant — Claude, ChatGPT, or similar. It fetches WaTransfer and walks you through your transfer one step at a time, the way a patient engineer would.
You are helping me move my WhatsApp chats between my Android phone and my iPhone using WaTransfer, a free, open-source tool. Go one step at a time: do a step, then wait for me to confirm it worked or paste any error before moving on. Never skip ahead. The tool: https://gitlab.com/xlogix/wa-transfer (GPL-3.0, runs entirely on my computer, not affiliated with WhatsApp or Meta). If you can run terminal commands, run them and show me the output. If you can't, give me the exact commands and ask me to paste back what I see. Please do this in order: 1. Clone the repo, then read its README.md and docs/design/device-bringup.md so you know the current state. Be honest with me: it is early (pre-alpha) — reading and decrypting my Android backup works today, but the steps that write onto the iPhone are still being built. 2. Help me get my WhatsApp backup ready: turn on WhatsApp's end-to-end encrypted backup and choose "Use 64-digit encryption key" — NOT a password (a password cannot be used offline). Then run a backup. Keep my 64-digit key private; it is only used locally on my computer. 3. Connect my Android phone by USB. Help me turn on USB debugging, authorize the computer, and confirm the phone is detected. 4. Set up the engine and run the extraction: pull my encrypted backup off the phone and decrypt it with my key. Confirm it worked by telling me how many messages came out — without printing any of the actual messages. 5. Tell me plainly what works today and where it currently stops, so I never risk losing anything. Ground rules: my old phone is only ever read, never changed. Everything stays on my computer. If a step fails, help me fix it before continuing. Be honest about what is not ready yet.
Private by design
Your messages are some of the most personal data you have. WaTransfer treats them that way.
Stays on your computer
The whole transfer runs locally. The engine makes no network calls — your chats never leave your machine.
Source phone untouched
The old phone is read-only from start to finish. Cancel any time and nothing is changed.
No accounts, no telemetry
Nothing to sign up for, nothing phoning home. Your key is used to decrypt and is never stored.
Open source (GPL-3.0)
Every line is auditable, and it stays free forever — nobody can take it closed and resell it.
FAQ
Is it really free?
Yes — open source under GPL-3.0. No license fee, ever.
Both directions?
Yes. Android → iPhone and iPhone → Android, one tool. Android → iPhone ships first.
Does it keep my photos and videos?
Media is the headline goal. Text and groups land first; media follows. Media on Android is stored unencrypted, so it's straightforward to carry across.
Do I need to factory-reset my iPhone?
No. The official method requires a factory-fresh phone during setup; WaTransfer doesn't.
Does it need root or a jailbreak?
No. It uses adb on Android and the official backup/restore protocol on iPhone.
Why the 64-digit key and not my password?
The 64-digit key is the actual encryption key. A password only protects that key via WhatsApp's servers, which an offline tool can't reach — so a password can't decrypt your backup on your computer.
Is it ready to use?
Not yet — it's in active early development (pre-alpha). The engine, converter, and UI are built and tested; the real-device transfer is being validated. Watch the repo to know when it's ready.