WhatsApp to delete all chats not backed up to Google Drive: What you need to know

However, the terms and conditions also meant that users needed to manually backup their WhatsApp data on Google Drive before November 12. This was to avoid loss of any WhatsApp data that is already on your Drive. In order, to refresh existing backups, users had to back up before October 30, 2018. This applied even to those relying on automatic backups for their WhatsApp data.

Now that the November 12 deadline is over, users need to make sure that their WhatsApp data has been saved. Anyone who has not done a manual backup, might find that their old chats and data are not saved to their Google Drive account. This could also result in loss of chat histories.

WhatsApp had also warned that any backups which had not been updated in over a year would be automatically removed from the Google Drive storage. This means if you have not backed up the account in the past one year, you are likely to find all the chat histories are gone.

Read more: WhatsApp backups to be deleted by Google Drive? Here’s what will happen 

So if you set up the account on a new Android phone, you are unlikely to get the chat history back for that particular WhatsApp account, if a manual backup was not done.

On Android, the WhatsApp chat is automatically backed up to the Google Drive. On iOS, WhatsApp chats are saved on the iCloud account by default. If you have not done a manual backup for your WhatsApp chats, it is best to do it now. Although older chat histories are likely to have been deleted unless you were doing regular manual backups.

Follow these steps for doing a chat backup for your WhatsApp

Open the WhatsApp app and tap the three dot menu on top right.

Select Settings > Chats > Chat backup.

Click on Chat backup and tap Back up. Make sure you are logged into your Google account to save data on Drive.