Anyone with WhatsApp history they don't want tied to one device
Your phone is gone. Your chats don't have to be.
Phone stolen, lost on a flight, dropped in the ocean. If you only relied on Google Drive's nightly sync, you have at best last night's WhatsApp, missing the morning. Better: an archive that already lived somewhere else.
Pain points
- Google Drive holds only one snapshot per account; the new sync overwrites it
- On-device Crypt15 backups rotate, only the last few survive on the SD card
- Lose the phone before the next sync and you lose since the last sync
- Restoring to a replacement phone requires Google Drive access AND the 64-digit key — easy to lose one
- Switching to a different phone number after a loss orphans the old account's history
How Chat Hoarding answers
- A .tarc on your Mac is independent of the phone, the SIM, and the WhatsApp account
- Restore the phone or skip restore — the archive doesn't care
- Open old conversations on macOS without needing to log into WhatsApp at all
- Refresh archive cadence is your call: weekly, before a trip, before a phone swap
Capabilities that matter for this use case
Easy, Medium, Advanced: get the backup off the phone
Companion app over wireless share, USB drag-drop via OpenMTP, or fully automatic adb pull bundled inside Chat Hoarding for Mac.
.tarc, one file, lifetime archive
Bundles manifest, decrypted msgstore.db, an optional contacts.json (imported address book) and manual_contacts.json (your in-app renames), and the media folder, all inside a macOS package. Double-click to open. Survives the phone.
Decrypts the Crypt15 backup locally
AES-256-GCM decryption with your 64-digit key. msgstore.db.crypt15, the only database WhatsApp writes to the user-accessible backup folder. Keys never leave the Mac.
Search across every chat, jump to every hit
Substring search across the whole archive: cross-chat hit counts in the sidebar, in-chat match counter with cycling. Same .tarc, instant results.
Ready to archive yours?
$99 lifetime · 2 Macs · revocable from the account page · 14-day refund