A WhatsApp status is made to be short-lived. Here is exactly how long it lasts, what happens to the copy on your phone, and what you can do if you want to keep one.
24 hours for everyone
A status disappears 24 hours after it is posted. After that, nobody can open it in WhatsApp — not you, and not anyone else. The person who posted it can also delete it earlier, and then it is gone at once.
About a day on your phone
When you view a status, WhatsApp writes a copy of it into a hidden folder on your phone. WhatsApp deletes that copy again about a day after writing it. So even a status you watched is only on your phone for a limited time — and the later in its 24 hours you watched it, the sooner it goes.
Selu shows this on every status: the viewer says Expires in about 23 h, Expires soon, or May already be gone. A status you have already saved says Saved.
Keep a status you viewed
You have three choices:
- Save it. In Selu, tap a status and tap Save. It is copied to your
gallery (
Pictures/StatusSaverorMovies/StatusSaver) and stays there until you delete it. - Turn on Keep statuses. In Selu’s Settings, turn on Keep statuses and choose 1, 3 or 7 days and how much space to use (500 MB, 1 GB or 2 GB). From then on, the app copies each status you view into its own folder, so you can still save it after WhatsApp has deleted it. The copies delete themselves when your chosen time is up; statuses you saved to the gallery are never touched.
- Auto-save. Turn on Auto-save and new statuses are saved to your gallery for you — photos, videos or both.
Keep statuses starts working from the moment you turn it on. It cannot bring back a status that was deleted before that.
Your own status
For statuses you post yourself, WhatsApp has its own options: you can save your status to your phone, and WhatsApp’s status archive can keep your past statuses. The WhatsApp Help Center explains both (links below).
Quick answers
- How long is a status visible? 24 hours after it is posted.
- How long is the file on my phone? About a day after WhatsApp writes it.
- Can I get back an expired status? Only if you saved it, or Keep statuses was already on when you viewed it.
- Does saving a status make it last longer for others? No. It only keeps a copy on your phone.
