How to Back Up Your Slack Archive Before Slack Deletes It Leave a comment

Slack provides a free model of its office communication app that is utilized by loads of on-line communities giant and small. This free model hides all messages which can be older than three months in age, that means you’ll be able to’t seek for or scroll as much as see messages older than that. Till just lately, Slack stored older messages on its server though free customers could not see them, the thought being that you possibly can improve to achieve entry to your group’s complete message archive.

That is altering this month. If in case you have a free workspace account, Slack is going to delete all messages older than one year on August 26, 2024. It is comprehensible you would possibly wish to preserve an archive of your older conversations, and you may, however you must act now.

Slack permits directors of any Slack occasion to export an archive of all messages in public channels. The archive is not precisely straightforward to learn or browse, however you’ll be able to change that with the appropriate software program. You may also migrate all your messages over to Discord, if you happen to’d desire to make use of a messaging service that does not restrict entry to your archive. Let’s begin by displaying you tips on how to again up your Slack archive after which discover the instruments that provide you with entry to it.

Export Your Slack Archive

First you will have to export your Slack archive. To do that, you must be an admin for the Slack you wish to export. In Slack, click on the identify of your Slack within the top-left nook, hover over Settings & administration, then click on Office settings. This may open the Settings & Permissions web page in your browser, the place you will notice an Import/Export Information button.

Click on that, then click on the Export tab. Choose the date vary you wish to obtain, and click on Begin Export. The export course of might take wherever from a couple of minutes to a few hours, relying on how large your Slack archive is. You’ll get a Slackbot DM when it’s carried out, although, so don’t really feel like you must depart the window open. When it’s prepared, the archive shall be a ZIP file, which it’s best to unarchive.

You will discover that the archive shouldn’t be straightforward to learn—the exported archive is only a bunch of JSON information. If you wish to browse or restore these conversations, you are going to must do some work.

Browse Your Archive on Your Laptop

ScreenshotCourtesy of Justin Pot

In order for you a person interface to discover your previous Slack archives I like to recommend Slack Log Viewer, which is a free obtain for Home windows or Mac. It is a little bit tough across the edges, granted, however with it you’ll be able to discover previous messages by channel, search previous messages, and even view profiles. Be aware that the Mac model is at the moment unsigned, so you will should right-click and click on Open with the intention to open it.