0

I have a conversation log in my iPhone (iPhone 11 Pro, iOS 14.0.1) that goes back to 2009. iOS says it is occupying 15.96GB:

ios screenshot showing 15.96GB phone storage usage

I have the phone set to save everything in my conversations (e.g.: high resolution images and videos) and I don't want to change this setting.

I want to back it up in iCloud so I upgraded to 200GB and connected my phone to WiFi and a charger. It started displaying the “Uploading messages” message and progress bar at the bottom of the screen. This message and progress bar no longer shows up and it has only uploaded 8.1GB:

ios screenshot showing 8.1GB iCloud storage usage

This number doesn't change anymore regardless of me charging the phone or not. I don't have Messages iCloud sync activated in any other device. Any idea why this seems to have gotten stuck?

Improve this question
4
  • I wonder if certain kinds of storage (like Messages) is compressed when backed up to iCloud but not compressed on the device itself. After all text compresses very well.
    – Steve Chambers
    Commented Sep 29, 2020 at 18:29
  • @SteveChambers quite possible. if I activate iCloud messages in my Mac what are the risks of getting sync errors and data loss?
    – mga
    Commented Sep 29, 2020 at 19:01
  • As I don't use Messages on my Mac, I couldn't tell you. You could get one of those iOS management apps like iMazing or iExplore, they will back up your device and give you access to the backup files.
    – Steve Chambers
    Commented Sep 29, 2020 at 21:18
  • the number has been slowly rising in icloud and is now up to 12.5GB. the app still doesn't show a progress bar but I suppose it will be done at some point in the future
    – mga
    Commented Oct 1, 2020 at 18:20

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
1

The number eventually grew to 15GB after a few weeks. Still no progress bar visible but at least it arrived there so I guess it just takes a long while, even with WiFi.

Improve this answer
1
  • Yes and the only way to speed this up is have a Mac on your local network and enable iCloud Caching so the iPhone can offload the content faster to the local content cache - support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/… choose either Only iCloud Content or All Content for your messages to be cached securely on the local Mac.
    – bmike ♦
    Commented Feb 21 at 3:12

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .