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How to export Android text messages with SMS Backup & Restore

Updated November 8, 2026

Android has no built-in button that saves your texts to a file. The free app SMS Backup & Restore (by SyncTech) fills that gap: it writes every text and picture message to one XML file, which you can keep as your original and turn into a readable PDF.

Steps

1. Install the app. On the Android phone that holds the messages, install SMS Backup & Restore from Google Play. Check that the developer is SyncTech Pty Ltd.
2. Start a backup. Open the app and tap Set up a backup (on some versions the button says Back up). Menu names change a little between versions.
3. Choose Messages. Turn on Messages. Turn off Phone calls unless you also want the call log, which is saved to a separate calls-….xml file.
4. Keep picture and group messages. Make sure MMS is included so picture and group messages are saved. SyncTech’s help pages list the setting as Menu › Settings › Backup Settings › MMS. You can also limit the backup to selected conversations in the advanced options.
5. Save it on the phone. Choose your phone (local storage) as the location. The app can also upload to Google Drive, Dropbox or OneDrive if you prefer.
6. Run it. Tap Back up now and wait until the app says it is finished. Large message histories with photos can take a while.
7. Copy the file to a computer. Use the app’s Send backup file option, or connect the phone with a USB cable and open the SMSBackupRestore folder (on most phones /storage/emulated/0/SMSBackupRestore/). The messages file is usually named like sms-20261108153000.xml.
8. Make the PDF. Open the exhibit tool and choose the sms-….xml file. Pick the conversations and dates you need, then create the PDF.

What the backup file contains

The XML file has one entry per message. SyncTech documents the fields on its fields in XML backup files page. The parts that matter for an exhibit:

• address: the other person’s phone number (for group messages, all numbers joined with ~).
• date: when the message was sent or received, stored as milliseconds since January 1, 1970 in UTC. Because it is an exact moment, it can be shown in any time zone; our tool shows the zone abbreviation (for example EST or EDT) next to each time.
• type: received, sent, draft, outbox, failed or queued. Drafts and unsent messages are left out of the exhibit unless you include them, and then they are labeled.
• body: the text. Picture messages (MMS) keep their text and attachments in separate parts; attachments are listed by name, type and size in the PDF.
• contact_name: the name saved in the phone’s contacts, or “(Unknown)”.

The app writes emoji as pairs of numeric codes. Some XML viewers reject that and refuse to open the file; our reader decodes them correctly.

Tips that save trouble later

• Keep the original file unchanged. Work from a copy. Any edit, even opening and re-saving in a text editor, changes the file’s SHA-256 hash, which is how you later show the file is the same one you exported.
• Check the size after copying. SyncTech suggests confirming that the file size on the computer matches what the app shows, so you know the copy finished.
• Back up before deleting anything. Messages deleted from the phone before a backup are not in the backup.
• Large files are normal. Photos inside picture messages make backups big (hundreds of megabytes or more). Our tool reads the file in pieces, so large backups work in a desktop browser.
• Write down how you made it. Note the date, the phone, the app version and where the file was saved. If anyone later asks how the export was made, you will have the answer.

If something looks wrong

• “This is a call-log backup”: you chose calls-….xml. Choose the sms-….xml file instead.
• Fewer messages than expected: check that MMS was turned on and that the backup covered all conversations. The source log page of the PDF shows the count stated in the backup and the count read.
• Times look off by hours: pick the time zone where the messages were sent in the tool’s time zone menu.

Next: turn the XML backup into a PDF, or read how to prepare text messages as a court exhibit.