How to download your end-to-end encrypted Messenger chats
Messenger turned on end-to-end encryption for personal chats, and the regular Download your information export stops where a chat moved. Everything after the move has its own download in Message storage.
Why your newest chats are not in the regular download
Meta cannot read end-to-end encrypted messages on its servers, so the regular export cannot include them. In a Facebook download, chats that moved appear under messages/e2ee_cutover with their history up to the move. The messages after it are kept in your secure storage, encrypted with your PIN or another method you set up, and Messenger gives you a separate download for them.
The steps
- Use a computer. Meta's help page describes this download on the web, not in the phone app.
- Open your chats on the web. messenger.com stopped working for messages in April 2026 and sends you to facebook.com/messages.
- Open the Messenger settings from your profile picture, then Privacy and safety, then End-to-end encrypted chats.
- Choose Message storage, then the option to download your secure storage data. Enter your password or PIN if asked.
- Keep the page open while the file is prepared; it can take several minutes. The result is a ZIP with one
Name_N.jsonfile per chat and amediafolder.
Menu names move around between versions, so look for "Message storage" if the labels differ on your screen.
When the download does not work
| What happens | What to try |
|---|---|
| There is no download option | Secure storage may be off for your account, and then nothing is stored to download. Meta warns that without secure storage your chats live only on your devices. Check Message storage on a computer. |
| The button does nothing, or the file never arrives | Some people report it only starts in another browser. Try Chrome or Edge, allow downloads for the site, and keep the tab in front until the file is saved. |
| It asks for a PIN you forgot | Meta's help says it cannot reset your PIN for you; you reset it on a device where you created or last entered it. |
| The ZIP opens but a chat looks short | That chat's older part is in the regular download, under e2ee_cutover. Choose both downloads together in Readback and they become one timeline. |
The December 2026 change for Android backups
Messenger's help page on restoring chats says that after December 2026 you will no longer be able to reach your chat history on a new device with the key saved in your Google Drive; Messenger will ask you to create a PIN instead. If you rely on that key and plan to change phones, set up a PIN first, and keep a downloaded copy of your encrypted chats as well.
Reading the two downloads as one
Choose the regular Facebook download and the encrypted chats download together in Readback. It matches chats by the people in them and shows each one from its first message to its last, with the encrypted part marked and its photos from the media folder.
Have both downloads? Open them together and read each chat as one timeline, in your browser.
Open your download in ReadbackReadback Pro, $8 paid once: every chat in one ZIP as pages that open offline with their photos, every message in one spreadsheet, and every chat as text. Get Pro on Gumroad or see what is free.
Questions
Can I download encrypted Messenger chats on my phone?
Meta's help page gives the steps on a computer. If the option is missing in the app, use a computer.
Are my encrypted chats deleted if I do not download them?
No. They stay in your secure storage and on your devices. The download is a copy you keep yourself, which matters if you lose your PIN or every device you use Messenger on.
Does Readback decrypt anything?
No. Meta decrypts the chats for you when you download them. Readback only reads the file you already have, on your own computer.
Sources
- Messenger Help Center: Add or update your security method for end-to-end encrypted chats. "You can download a copy of your end-to-end encrypted chat history at any time", and the Message storage steps
- Messenger Help Center: Restore your end-to-end encrypted chats with iCloud Drive. After December 2026 the key saved in Google Drive no longer restores chat history on new devices
- Messenger Help Center: Options to restore end-to-end encrypted chats. PIN, Apple account, Google account and code options
- Meta: End-to-end encryption on Messenger explained (March 2024). Secure storage and chat history
- Storyboard18: Meta to shut Messenger website in April 2026. messenger.com sends people to facebook.com/messages
- Lauri-Nomme/fbarchive on GitHub. An open source importer that documents both file formats: message_N.json in the regular download, Name_N.json with a media folder in the encrypted one
Last checked: October 29, 2026.