What is inside the download

Request it in Accounts Center → Your information and permissions → Download your information, choose Messages and the JSON format. The .zip you get back has one folder per conversation inside messages/inbox/ (under your_facebook_activity/ in recent downloads), named like janedoe_10158…, containing:

  • message_1.json with the newest messages, then message_2.json, message_3.json and so on for older ones, each listed newest first;
  • audio/ with voice messages as .mp4 audio clips, plus photos/, videos/ and files/.

Every name and message is stored with its UTF-8 bytes written out one by one, so "José" appears as José and a 😂 as 😂. Every time is a UTC timestamp in milliseconds.

Where a chatbot falls short

  • Scrambled text. Unless it is told to repair the encoding, an assistant copies José into its answer, or quietly "corrects" words it should leave alone.
  • Order. A long conversation has to be stitched together from several files, each in reverse order, by timestamp.
  • Voice messages. The download only points to the audio files; the words are inside them.
  • Length. A long conversation gets summarised or cut off in a chat window.
  • Time zones. UTC timestamps need converting, and the record should say to which time zone.

Encrypted chats are a separate download

Since December 2023 personal Messenger chats are end-to-end encrypted by default, and those messages are not in Download your information. On messenger.com, Privacy & safety → End-to-end encrypted chats → Message storage → Download secure storage data gives you a separate file. If a conversation in your download seems to stop early, this is usually why.

What works

  1. Download your messages as JSON, and the secure storage file if the conversation is recent.
  2. Repair the encoding, join every message file of the conversation and sort it by time.
  3. Transcribe each voice message on its own and put the text where it was sent.
  4. Print the time zone and a SHA-256 fingerprint of the download on the cover.

Our Messenger Chat to PDF tool does this: upload the .zip, type the person's name, check the first messages free with their voice messages written out, and get the whole conversation as one PDF for a one-time payment of $5.