How to open a WhatsApp chat .txt file on any device

A WhatsApp chat .txt is plain text, so the apps already on your phone or computer can open it. If WhatsApp gave you a .zip, unzip it first: the chat is the .txt inside, called _chat.txt on iPhone or something like WhatsApp Chat with Sam.txt on Android. Opening it takes a minute. Reading a long chat in it is the harder part, and the second half of this guide is about that.

First, check what you have

WhatsApp's help page on exporting says an iPhone export is always a .zip, with or without media. An export from WhatsApp Web is a .zip too, with no media in it. An Android export without media is a single .txt you can open straight away. With media, Android usually packs the text and the files into one .zip.

If you can't find the file at all, see where WhatsApp saves an export. On Android, the file only exists in the place you sent it to.

On iPhone

1. Open the Files app and find the .zip. Search for “WhatsApp Chat” if you are not sure where it went.
2. Tap the .zip. Files creates a folder next to it with everything that was inside.
3. Open the folder and tap _chat.txt to read it.

If the export reached you by email or in a message, save it to Files first, then follow the same steps. The photos, videos and voice messages sit in the same folder as _chat.txt.

On Android

1. Open Files by Google. On Samsung phones the app is called My Files.
2. Tap Browse, then open Downloads or the folder you saved the export to.
3. Tap the .zip, then Extract, then Done. The files land in the same folder.
4. Tap the .txt. If Android asks which app to use, pick any text viewer.

Saved it to Google Drive? Open Drive, tap the three dots next to the file and choose Download first. A .txt from an export without media can skip step 3.

On Windows

1. Right-click the .zip, choose Extract All, then Extract.
2. Open the new folder and double-click the .txt. It opens in Notepad.
3. Press Ctrl+F to find a word or a name.

On a Mac

1. Double-click the .zip in Finder. macOS unzips it into a folder in the same place.
2. Double-click the .txt. It opens in TextEdit.
3. Press Command+F to find a word or a name.

To glance at the file without opening an app, select it in Finder and press the Space bar.

Why it is hard to read

Opening the file is quick. Reading it is slow, for a few reasons.

• It is one long scroll. There are no bubbles and no day breaks, just line after line that each start with a date and time.
• Media is only a file name. A voice message looks like <attached: 00000012-AUDIO-2025-03-03-11-21-02.opus> on iPhone or PTT-20250303-WA0007.opus (file attached) on Android. To hear it, you open that file from the folder. Without media, the line just says “audio omitted” or <Media omitted>.
• Long messages break the pattern. The second and later lines of a message have no date, so they look like stray text.
• WhatsApp's notices are mixed in. People joining, leaving or changing their security code sit between real messages.
• Some characters are invisible. iPhone exports put hidden direction marks before attachments and notices, and can put a narrow no-break space before AM and PM. You can't see them, but they can make an exact search or a spreadsheet formula miss a line.
• Dates follow the phone. The same day can be written 3/4/25, 04/03/2025 or 2025-03-04, depending on the phone's language and region.

What's in a WhatsApp chat export explains each kind of line.

Opening it in a spreadsheet

A spreadsheet lets you filter the chat by a name or a word. It needs the right settings, or it will change your text.

Google Sheets

1. Go to File > Import > Upload and choose the .txt.
2. Set Separator type to Tab. Chats rarely contain tabs, so each line stays whole in column A.
3. Untick Convert text to numbers, dates, and formulas. Otherwise Sheets may read 3/4/25 in its own date order, and a message that starts with = can turn into a formula.
4. Click Import data. Then use Data > Create a filter to show only the lines with a name or a word.

Excel

Go to Data > From Text/CSV and pick the .txt. Set File Origin to 65001: Unicode (UTF-8) so emoji and accents come through. Set Delimiter to Tab, then click Load.

Even with these settings, you get one row per line of text, not per message. A long message spreads over several rows, and the date, sender and text share one cell. Here is how that compares with the CSV from the free viewer:

Let the free viewer tidy it up

The free WhatsApp chat viewer does the cleanup for you. Drop in the .zip or the .txt. Your browser reads it on your own device: nothing is uploaded and you don't need an account. Then download:

• a PDF: a print view with page numbers and the chat name on every page, which you save as PDF;
• a clean TXT with every message in date order;
• a CSV with one row per message, with date, time, sender, type and text in their own columns;
• one web page (HTML) that opens in any browser.

Photos and videos are skipped. Voice messages are counted and named where they were sent, but not written out. That is what LogMyChat does when you unlock a chat: every voice message is transcribed in the language spoken and placed under the date and time it was sent, in the PDF, TXT, CSV and HTML downloads. The free overview writes one of them out and shows the exact price before you pay.

For a chat you want to print as a PDF or keep as a family memory, those pages show what the finished record looks like.

Common questions

Why do I see odd symbols instead of emoji?

The app opened the file with the wrong text encoding. WhatsApp writes UTF-8, so open the file as UTF-8. In Excel, that is File Origin 65001: Unicode (UTF-8). The CSV from the free viewer is saved so that Excel reads it correctly.

Can I open it in Word or Google Docs?

Yes. Both open plain text. You still get one line per message, and a long chat makes a very long document.

How do I play the voice messages?

They are .opus files in the same folder as the .txt. A free player such as VLC plays them on most computers. To read them instead, see how to turn .opus voice messages into text.

Why does my file start later than the chat did?

The export may have been cut short. WhatsApp export limits shows how to check and what to do. LogMyChat can only read what the file contains, so check the first date before you pay.