WhatsApp users on Android may soon have to pay to backup chats on Google Drive; here's why

Google and WhatsApp have announced that starting from December 2023, WhatsApp chat and media backups on Android will begin counting toward your Google Account cloud storage limit. This includes the 15GB of free storage that comes with every Google Account.

This change marks a reversal from 2018 when WhatsApp backups stopped counting toward Google Drive storage. The update will start rolling out next month for WhatsApp Beta users and will gradually be implemented for all WhatsApp Android users across the first half of 2024.

Users will be notified 30 days before this change via a banner in WhatsApp Settings > Chats > Chat backup. If users reach their storage limit, they will need to free up space to resume backups by removing items they do not need.

Google already offers storage management tools to quickly bulk delete photos and other large files. Another suggestion is deleting items from WhatsApp, thus reducing storage used by your next WhatsApp backup.

When will you pay to back up WhatsApp Chats?

The other alternative is to purchase more storage with Google One, which starts at Rs 130 per month for 100GB, Rs 210 for 200GB and Rs 650 for 2TB plan. Google will soon provide eligible users with limited, one-time Google One offers. The users can also get annual plans in order to save more. If the 15GB standard storage is full, the user will have to pay in order to get more storage on Google Drive and then back up their WhatsApp data.  

These changes will apply to personal Google Accounts. If you have a Google Workspace subscription through work or school, your storage quota will not be impacted at this time.

WhatsApp Android Users Lose Advantage

This move brings the WhatsApp backup experience on Android in line with how it works on other platforms. It's worth noting that Android users have enjoyed five years of WhatsApp backups not counting toward Google Drive storage limits — a privilege that was never extended to iOS users.

Users who do not want to use their Google account for backups will have the option to use the WhatsApp Chat Transfer when moving to a new Android device. This works wirelessly as long as both phones have Wi-Fi turned on.

Google assures that nothing about WhatsApp backups will change apart from the potential for storage limits affecting whether you can continue to cloud save your data. If you delete things in WhatsApp, it will delete them in your cloud backup, which can help you save space in Drive.

Also read: WhatsApp Channels cross 500 million monthly users: Diljit Dosanjh, Katrina Kaif, Allu Arjun among most popular channels

Also read: Reliance Jio to launch upgraded JioBharat 4G phone at Rs 999 with support for UPI, WhatsApp, Live TV streaming