Your Signal chats can now be backed up for free or with paid storage
Signal is finally adding chat backups, giving users a way to keep their messages safe without compromising on privacy
There’s nothing quite as frustrating as losing old chats, the inside jokes, the family photos, the little memories tucked away in conversations. Most messaging apps have long solved this problem with cloud backups, but for Signal users, that hasn’t been an option. If you switched phones or lost one, your messages were simply gone.
That’s beginning to change. Signal is rolling out chat backups, with both a free and paid option. For years, the app resisted backups because of its strict privacy-first approach, but the new system tries to balance security with convenience.
Here’s how it works. The free plan gives you 100 MB of storage, covering text messages and the last 45 days of media. Signal says this is enough for most heavy texters since messages are compressed before being stored. But for those who want a longer archive, there’s a $1.99 per month tier offering 100 GB of storage. Unlike other platforms where backups are automatic, Signal’s will be opt-in; you’ll need to enable it manually in settings.
The most interesting part isn’t the storage size but how the backups are secured. Instead of linking data to your account or payment method, Signal generates a 64-character recovery key directly on your device. That key, and only that key, can unlock your archive. It’s a system designed so that not even Signal can access your chats.
This update also shifts Signal closer to what rivals like WhatsApp, Telegram, and Messenger already provide, though with a heavier emphasis on privacy. While others tie backups to your phone number or cloud account, Signal is betting that users will prefer the extra layer of anonymity.
Right now, the feature is only live on the Android beta version, but iOS support is expected down the line. For Signal’s 70 million monthly users, it could be a turning point: the app is no longer asking people to choose between security and convenience.
The bigger question is whether this balance makes Signal more appealing to the everyday user who just wants their chats to be safe. Privacy purists may see the recovery key approach as a win, while casual users might view the limited free tier as too restrictive. Either way, it’s a notable shift, one that makes Signal feel less like an outlier and more like a serious alternative in the messaging world.
Ogbonda Chivumnovu
