See updates at the end of article
Roughly five months ago, I had issues moving my text messages from the Lenovo P780 to the Nokia Lumia 730 but after some trial and error I succeeded. (See Resolved: How To Transfer SMS From Android to Windows Phone 8.1). Unfortunately using this method the other way round doesn’t quite work flawlessly i.e. transferring SMS from a Windows Phone (Nokia Lumia 730) to an Android phone (Lenovo P70-A). The android app that works the magic seems to have issues working on some Android KitKat versions.
NOTE: I tried the process below on the second release of Windows 10 Technical Preview for Phones. It should work on any Windows Phone IMO. You might be needing an Android device that runs JellyBean if the Android app described below fails to work properly on your KitKat phone. The app seems to have microSD card issues on KitKat.
Also this will only work on Lumia phones with SD card. Sorry :(
To begin, Download and Install Lenovo Backup and Restore version 2.0.159.0605.5c1a0(row) on your Android device
Install and Run Transfer My Data app on your Windows Phone. Click on the three dots at the bottom of the app and select Export to SD card. The app will scan your phone and then present you with what you can backup to SD card. If you’re lucky, your text messages will be part of them. Follow the screenshots and take note of where the backup is stored.
Copy the sms.vmsg backup file from your Windows Phone and transfer it to PC. You could transfer it directly to your android phone via Bluetooth if you so please.
Go to your Android device and run the Lenovo Backup and Restore. Make sure you have a few SMS on the phone then run a backup as shown in the screenshots below. The goal here is to create an sms backup on the device then overwrite it with the Windows Phone backup file.
Click on Backup user data >>> select Messages and click the backup button
Take note of where the backup was created.
Navigate to the backup location via your phone’s file browser, where you will find an SMS folder. Within this folder is an sms.vmsg file. Replace this file with the sms.vmsg backup file you created on your Windows Phone device.
Go back to the Backup and Restore app and click on your backup as shown below. If everything is in order, it should show your windows phone backed up messages. Click on restore and your Windows Phone sms backup will be transferred to your android device.
Congratulations! You’ve successfully transferred your SMS from Windows Phone To Android. If this Android device is serving as an intermediary to the actual android device you want to restore your SMS to (due to KitKat issues described above), you will need to install Lenovo’s SYNCit app which allows you sync your SMS to the cloud or backup to SD card
For cloud backup method, launch the app, switch to SMS tab and select Back up SMS option as shown below. You will need to register an account for this to work. Once the sync is complete, install the SYNCit app on your target device, sign in and then use the restore SMS option to download your SMS back to your phone.
The SD card backup method works somewhat similar to what I’ve detailed previously in the Lenovo Backup and Restore app.
Launch the SYNCit app, switch to the Box tab and then select Back up to SD card
Navigate to the backup folder and copy the backup created there. It should be a zip file.
Install the SYNCit app on your target device, create a folder layout similar to that circled in the last screenshot on your phone and place the backup file in it. Launch SYNCit, switch to Box tab, Back up to SD card then use the Restore to SD card function.
Phew! Tedious right? It took me hours to figure this out but it was totally worth it in the end. I ain’t messing with Windows Phone no more as this is way too much stress. I hope this guide helps you successfully transfer all SMS from your Windows Phone 8 or Windows Phone 10 device to any android phone.
Be sure to share and let me know if it works for you or not! Cheers
UPDATE 25th April 2015: Microsoft has released a contacts+message backup app though it only backs up to SD card and it has issues at the moment backing up sms on dual sim Windows Phone.
UPDATE 8th April 2016: For those of you with a Lumia that lacks SD card storage, try this method >> How to transfer Windows Phone SMSes to Android Using Python
UPDATE 4th March 2017: If the above guide doesn’t work for you, check out this article which requires a Windows 10 PC, and access to the Microsoft account associated with the Windows phone. How to transfer SMS text messages from Windows phones to Android devices
UPDATE 7th June 2017: As Leonardo mentioned in the comment section, check out Import SMS from Windows Phone
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Please rate & share this article to help others. Thanks
thanx for this article.. i found hope to protect my sms. I’ve just exported my messages (4k) to sd card using transfer my data app as said copied with the path ended with “”/sms””. my new mobile is MOTO not lenovo . can u provide me the way how to restore those to my moto mobile?
This guide is not specific for a particular mobile phone manufacturer. It’s meant to work for any Android phone so just try the various options here to restore your backup to your Moto device
it will helpful if u can provide a step wise procedure as shown in the article. can it be done by sms backup and restore app?
No it can’t be done with that app as far as I can tell. Just read the various options in the article and lick which works best for you as I can’t provide another step by step guide.
The latest update to the article seems to work for most people
thanx , but am not getting the window shown above which is havingg backup data to select………..
Please try the app that was recommended at the end of this article as an update
thanq .. am going to do..
finally…!!!!! got it// thank you so much….@ude@udegbunamchuks:disqus
You’re welcome man
Great article. I can suggest another method. You can try ‘Import SMS from Windows Phone’ app. You can find it on Play Store. It is Free and has no limit for the messages which can be imported. Also, it has no Ads.
On the Play Store page you can find a tutorial video which guides you step-by-step how to export your messages from Windows Phone. If your Windows Phone device hasn’t an SD Card, you can use ‘contacts+message backup’ app to export your messages. If it has SD Card, you can also use ‘Transfer my data’ app. Both apps export a file (.msg from ‘contacts+message backup’ and .vmsg from ‘Transfer my data’).
Simply copy the .vmsg/.msg into your Android device and the app will search for all the backup files. You can select from which numbers you want to import your SMS messages or you can import them all at once.
Thanks for the tip. I’ve added it to the post :)
Thank you for taking it into consideration!
The problem with this app is that it says it will overwrite your current messaging service and may cause issues with sending or receiving future sms. Could you link to the Lenovo Backup and Restore app you used in this article please as I am unable to find it on the Play store
The app is right there in the article. Here you go: https://www.patchworkoftips.com/downloads/Backup&Restore.apk
Ah, I missed that, many thanks. I have now successfully replaced the file and restored the sms from my windows phone, but when I go into messages, they’re not there. Where would they be sent to if they have been restored.
@Alan: If your messages aren’t showing in your sms box, then the restore didn’t complete properly OR your phone is taking it’s sweet time to update its database. Either way, if the SMS don’t show up after like 1 hour, you might want to try the other methods listed at the end of the article
I mentioned in the app’s description on Play Store, that it handles incoming SMS messages during the restoring of the messages. So any incoming SMS during the restoration is saved in inbox and can be viewed after the restoration.
After the restoration is complete, it ask you to accept your SMS app as the default SMS app. Even if something goes wrong (which is most unlikely to happen), you can set back your SMS app when you’re going to the messaging app.
Leonardo, thank you. I didn’t read the description in the store so missed it altogether. It has worked rather successfully so thank you both. My phone has organised them oddly, but nevertheless, I do have them all back :)
Great to hear that. You’re welcome sir
You’re welcome! My app’s role is to read and transform those messages from the Windows Phone file formats and insert them in your Android phone’s inbox. The way your messages are organized depends on your messaging app. Glad you managed to retrieve them!
GREAT ARTICLE! THANK YOU!!!
You’re welcome
I’ve created a Telegram bot – that will convert sms.vmsg file to SMS Backup&Restore xml format. http://telegram.me/Wp2AndroidBot , sources of the bot can be found here: https://bitbucket.org/AlfeG/windowsphone2android/overview
Say hello to bot and he will provide link to required apps
Surprised there’s no comments…But I’m glad I found this article. I found another way to move from Windows Phone to Android but not the other way around (tempted to go from OS to OS from time to time while keeping up all my messages, but sure that would probably break it on the WP side).
The only suggestion is that you don’t need to already make a backup to restore the SMS. As long as the vmsg file is in something like /backup/data/anyfoldername/sms/sms.vmsg it’ll take with no problem. I’m not going to mess with Kitkat but all I’ve read is that you’d have to toggle the ‘default SMS app’ in order to write the SMS databases. If it’s stuck on messaging it’s locked on other apps.
The new lenovo syncit app save the SMS backup in .txt format when restoring it does not recognize .vmsg file of Windows mobile. What to-do
@Peekay the new Lenovo syncit app doesn’t work with this guide. You have to use the one i linked to here
Hello.
Unfortunately, this method won’t work for Lumia phones that don’t have expandable memory (eg the 920 & 930, which I own). I’ve been looking for a way to transfer hundreds of sms from my Lumia to my Android and can’t find any working solution yet. :(
@Spacyzuma this post don old oh. So up till now them never give you una working method to move all SMS? *sighs*
I finally found a method that worked. It involved installing Python on my computer and running a script. But it worked.
I transferred almost 3000 sms with about 99% success.
@Spacyzuma abeg share the link make i append am to this post for people in your shoes. Thanks :-)
Here it is:
https://medium.com/@matteocontrini/how-to-transfer-windows-phone-smses-to-android-6d5e941f3362#.2f369ip0a
@Spacyzuma: Correct person. Thanks for the link. I’ve added it to the post
Thank you Thank you Thank you
It works for me. I restored 3720 msg from that WP.
Then I got the idea to merge the win messages with the 29 android messages because I started using my new android phone without finding a solution to restore from win, and got 29 messages..and the merge works again..3749 msg alltogether
I’ve looking for an issue in many forums but without luck. Until I found a commercial soluton (vmg converter) but don’t want to pay money ;-)
Thanks again..you saved me
Takaharo: Thanks for the feedback. Glad to know it still works
hey buddy. It worked for me to restore all the messages but the problem is that it doesn’t show them in my message app or message inbox. It is confirmed that all of them are there as I tried to create a backup it backed up all the 1238 message which were restored earlier. Now don’t know where to go to display all those restored messages…
please help on this.
@Manoj: If the messages are not showing then I don’t think this method works for your phone. You might want to try deleting all the messages, rebooting your phone and trying the message restore process again
After searching a lot and wasting too much of time finally I found your post which really helped me out. I almost lost hope in getting sms transferred to Moto G, I am selling my Lumia 730.
Your post is a genuine one that really works, thanks for adding the images.
Regards,
Adi.
@Aditya you’re very welcome. Glad I got you through this mess. Lol
This wasn’t working on my lollipop so I dusted off my jellybean tablet and this worked. This actually works. Thank you so much. I had around 20,000 messages that a friend wanted to keep and this worked wonders. Thank you so much.
@Ali you’re welcome. Hopefully Microsoft will release an easier way to move SMS to other platforms