Are messages deleted from WhatsApp when the app is uninstalled - briefly?
When you uninstall WhatsApp, your chat history does not get deleted from the app's servers. However, the messages will no longer be accessible on your device unless you reinstall the app and restore your backup.
Are messages deleted from WhatsApp when the app is uninstalled - in detail?
When a user decides to uninstall the WhatsApp application, it raises a common question: do the messages disappear along with the app? The answer is nuanced and depends on several factors.
Firstly, it's important to understand that WhatsApp stores messages in two primary locations: your device's local storage and WhatsApp's cloud servers. When you uninstall the app from your device, the locally stored messages are deleted from your phone. This means that if you had not backed up your chats recently or at all, those messages will no longer be accessible through the app on that specific device.
However, this action does not automatically delete the messages from WhatsApp's servers. The company maintains a backup of all conversations, which includes text, images, videos, and other media shared within chats. This backup is crucial for users who want to restore their conversation history if they switch devices or reinstall the app.
If you had enabled automatic backups in WhatsApp's settings, your messages would be regularly saved to Google Drive (on Android) or iCloud (on iOS). These backups are not affected by uninstalling the app and can be restored when you reinstall WhatsApp on the same device or a new one.
Moreover, if you choose to delete your WhatsApp account entirely rather than just uninstalling the app, all of your messages and data will be permanently removed from both your device and WhatsApp's servers. This action is irreversible, and you will lose access to all your chat history, media, and other information associated with your account.
In summary, while uninstalling the WhatsApp app does delete locally stored messages on your device, it does not affect the backups stored in cloud services like Google Drive or iCloud. For complete message deletion, you would need to delete your WhatsApp account altogether.