Best Practice for Transfer apps and data from old to new phone

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#1

Dear Sailors,

I want to switch from my Xperia 10 with my digitizer trouble to my XA2, but without data loss and with all the apps that I have for SFOS and for Android. Can someone tell me the best practice to get this done?

I am using WhatsApp and gMaps with microG for navigation.

Thank you in advance!

Cheers,
Dejan

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#2

Hi, there is no way to backup apps, but I found it easy to reinstall them along the way when needed, it permits to do some cleanup. But their data must be moved manually.
For the rest, here what I did on my side when reflashing:

  • for Whatsapp, use the official method: https://faq.whatsapp.com/android/chats/how-to-restore-your-chat-history (files located in android_storage/Whatsapp)
  • Use Sailfish backup for almost everything else (notes, messages, …)
  • If you want to keep MMS images, backup .local/share/commhistory/ and move it on your new phone (after restoring the Sailfish backup)
  • don’t forget to move any other relevant app data, or things like moving 2FA of your Steam account.
#3

I do not know much about Whatsapp but Signal and Threema produce data backups which wirk fine if put on an SD-Card. There are cloud options but these are no options for me.You could save some stuff in fennec/Firefox but you would have to trust cloud services there too.

I understand that one loves to save data but moving on with a lighter load can also make you happy. When I did a reset lately I could save my messenger data and the normal SF backup. I turned out that I am happier with a few apps less and wonderful new ambiences.