How to Transfer SMS and iMessage Texts from One iPhone to Another iPhone

If you have valuable SMS, MMS, and iMessage on your current iPhone, you might not want to keep them. Instead, you’ll want to transfer them to your new iPhone when you switch. Similarly, if you need to wipe your iPhone for troubleshooting, you’ll want to back up your messages and restore them later on the same iOS device.

In this tutorial, we will show you how to transfer messages from iPhone to iPhone.

Use iCloud Messages

iCloud can backup text messages and iMessages from your iPhone and store them in the cloud. When you sign in with the same Apple ID on another iPhone, these messages are automatically downloaded to the new iOS device. Here’s how to do it:

1) Open the Settings app on your current/old iPhone.

2) Tap your name at the top and go to iCloud > Show All.

3) Click “Messages”and turn on the “Sync this iPhone”toggle. In iOS 15 and earlier, you just need to turn on the toggle for messages.

Note. It will take some time to upload all your texts to iCloud. Therefore, it’s best to leave your iPhone connected to Wi-Fi and a power source so that it can back up your messages. If it was already enabled, that’s great, as your messages are already stored in iCloud and ready to be downloaded to your new device. Please proceed to the next step.

5) Now take your new iPhone, where you probably already signed into your Apple ID when you set it up. If in the rare case you haven’t, open the Settings app and tap Sign in at the top. Then use your Apple ID on your old iPhone and sign in.

After that, tap your name at the top of the Settings app, go to iCloud > Show All > Messages, and turn on the “Sync this iPhone”toggle. Make sure this iPhone is connected to the internet so messages are synced from iCloud to local storage.

Messages in iCloud is the easiest way to send text messages from iPhone to iPhone. This iCloud sync ensures that your texts and iMessages are synced, backed up and available across all your devices.

In addition, there are other ways to ensure that you don’t lose iPhone messages, and it’s better if you know about them too.

Use backups to transfer messages from one iPhone to another

Let’s say you don’t have enough iCloud space to back up your messages, or you’re hesitant to upload your texts to iCloud. In this case, you can transfer them using device backups. You can back up your iPhone to Mac or PC, or to iCloud.

When you back up your iPhone to iCloud or a computer, it also backs up your messages, among other things. And when you restore this iCloud, local Finder or iTunes backup to another iPhone, you will get all your previous message history from the earlier iPhone.

Important: It’s important to know that if you’ve already enabled Messages in iCloud (first method above), then neither your iCloud backup nor your computer’s backup will contain Messages because your iCloud already has them. So you can only use one of the above methods.

Pro Tip: If you haven’t enabled Messages in iCloud yet, I recommend backing up your iPhone to your computer and/or iCloud first. Now that you have a backup file of your messages, you can enable Messages in iCloud. This little hack will ensure that your messages are saved in two places – in a backup file and in iCloud. After that, sign in to your new iPhone with your Apple ID and turn on iCloud Messages or restore a backup to get all your texts back.

Related: How to sync your iPhone with another iPhone or iPad

Take screenshots or screen recordings of your messages

The two methods inverse to offer a smooth experience. Moreover, you can also take screenshots of your iPhone text messages or make screen recordings. They may serve to preserve memories or be used to establish evidence in the future. You can even take long scrolling screenshots of your conversations using a third-party iOS app.

Once you have captured screenshots and screen recordings, be sure to back them up or export them to another smartphone. Moreover, you can even convert multiple screenshots to PDF.