Tired of Google Drive storage limits? WhatsApp is building its own encrypted cloud

Meta's new backup service offers 2GB of free storage and a 50GB paid tier to help Android users escape Google's shrinking 15GB storage caps.

WhatsApp is reportedly working on a way to back up your chats in a place other than Google Drive or iCloud. Meta is now looking to host chat backups on its own servers where it will use end-to-end encryption to keep user data safe. It’s expected that there will be a free tier and a paid tier.

On the free tier, users are looking at getting 2GB of storage for their chat backups, while paid users will get 50GB of storage for $0.99 (it's unclear is this is per month or per year). In screenshots shared by WABetaInfo, users on Android will be given the choice of choosing a chat backup provider, either WhatsApp or Google. It reassures users that their data is safe, even from Meta.

The chats are protected with a passkey, so you’ll be able to access them with a fingerprint, face, or app lock–it’s your choice. The passkey is then stored in your password manager. The backups are encrypted with a secure 64-digit encryption key, which is very secure.

This move should come as a relief to users freeloading from Google and are constantly nagged to pay for extra storage for supposedly being near full capacity on their account storage as it’ll mean you can delete your WhatsApp backups from there, and store them on Meta’s infrastructure.

WABetaInfo also notes that it’s not known if the free storage will be for everyone, or just those subscribed to WhatsApp Plus. If it does end up being for everyone then perhaps the paid tier will be added to WhatsApp Plus, these are details we will learn after the feature is out.

Source and image: WABetaInfo

Source

Hope you enjoyed this news post. Feedback welcome.

Posted Tuesday 28 April 2026 at 5:27 pm AEST (my time).

News posts: 2023 5,800+ | 2024 5,700+ | 2025 5,700+ | 2026 (to end of March) 1,297

RIP Matrix