Apple ships an app called "Move to iOS" that helps Android users come to iPhone. There is no corresponding "Move to Android" app from Apple. This is not an oversight.
The practical effect: when you switch to Android, Apple helps you take approximately none of the following — your iMessage threads, your call history, your voicemails, your Safari history, your Notes with formatting, anything in Messages in iCloud, anything in iCloud Backup. Google's own "Switch to Android" tool handles contacts, calendar events, and photos. The rest is on you.
That's what OpenExtract is for. This is the workflow.
Step zero: make a final backup, encrypted
Before you swap SIMs, plug the iPhone into a computer and make one last encrypted backup. Finder on Mac, iTunes (or the Apple Devices app) on Windows. Tick "Encrypt local backup" and set a password you'll remember for five years. Click "Back Up Now."
If you want the longer version of why encryption here, we wrote a short piece on that. The one-line version: encrypted backups contain more data, and you'll want the extra data.
This single backup becomes your time capsule. Everything below is "how to get things out of it."
What transfers natively, and what doesn't
A quick matrix. "Transfers" means some official tool moves it for you. "Doesn't" means you need to handle it yourself:
- Contacts — transfers. Google Contacts imports vCards natively; Android phones sync from your Google account automatically.
- Photos & videos — transfers. Google Photos, or a USB copy from the Mac.
- Email and calendar — transfers. Most people use Gmail/Google Calendar anyway.
- Messages (iMessage / SMS) — doesn't. Android cannot import iMessage threads. Not in 2025. Not with any official tool.
- Call history — doesn't. Android has no import path for a foreign call log.
- Voicemails — doesn't. Voicemails live on the carrier's network or in your phone's own storage; they don't cross.
- Notes with formatting — partially. Plain text transfers if you sync Notes to Google via an intermediate app. Rich formatting and attachments usually don't.
- Safari history, saved passwords — doesn't. Chrome won't accept a Safari history import.
- Health and activity data — doesn't. Android's Health Connect can import some formats, but there's no direct pipe from iPhone.
The realistic strategy: import what you can, archive what you can't
This is the shift in thinking that helps. The things Android does import (contacts, photos, calendar) — you move those. The things Android doesn't import — you don't try to force into Android's native apps. You archive them into formats that outlive any phone, and you keep the archive.
That means: your iMessage threads become a PDF or an HTML folder you can read on any device for the rest of your life. Your call history becomes a CSV. Your voicemails become a folder of .m4a files with a CSV index. These aren't "transferred" to Android — they're lifted out of Apple's walled garden entirely.
The workflow, concretely
With the encrypted backup sitting on your computer, here's the full sequence.
1. Contacts → Google
In OpenExtract, export contacts as vCard (.vcf). Open contacts.google.com, click "Import," upload the file. Done. Your new Android phone will sync them down automatically on first setup.
2. Photos → Google Photos or a local archive
You have two choices. If you're comfortable in Google's ecosystem, install Google Photos on the iPhone before you swap, turn on auto-backup, wait for it to finish. Or: export photos from the backup via OpenExtract — you'll get the original HEIC/JPEG/MOV files with all EXIF metadata preserved, including timestamps and GPS. Copy them wherever you want.
The second route is better if you care about keeping original files without re-compression. Google Photos sometimes re-encodes.
3. Messages → PDF and HTML archive
Export messages with OpenExtract as PDF (for threads you might print or share) and HTML (for full browsability with inline attachments). You can't put these into Android's Messages app — that app has no import mechanism — but you can keep the archive anywhere: a folder in Dropbox, Google Drive, your Desktop, a USB drive in a drawer. The archive is searchable. The archive doesn't expire.
If there are specific threads you want to continue on Android via SMS, that's a separate migration — the other party sends the next message, your Android phone receives it, the new thread begins. The archive is about the old threads.
4. Call history → CSV
Export call history from OpenExtract. You'll get a CSV with one row per call: timestamp, number, duration, direction (in/out/missed). Useful for: billing disputes, legal records, rebuilding a contact list from who you actually talked to, a surprising amount of nostalgia.
5. Voicemails → folder of audio files
Export voicemails. You'll get the original audio files (.m4a on newer iOS) plus a CSV with caller, duration, and timestamp. If any of these are important (a message from someone who's no longer around, a recording of a specific moment), treat them like photos — back them up in at least two places.
We wrote more about voicemails here.
6. Notes → plain text
Export notes from OpenExtract. You'll get plain text files organized by the folder structure you had on iPhone. If you want them on Android, paste them into Google Keep, Obsidian, or whatever note app you're moving to. The plain text is the durable form; the rich formatting was always going to be lossy.
7. Safari history → CSV (if you care)
Most people don't bother. But if you want to preserve "that recipe site I found in 2019," export Safari history from an encrypted backup. It's a CSV with URL, title, visit time. Searchable forever.
On the psychology of leaving
A thing we've noticed from talking to people doing this: the anxiety is almost never about the data itself. It's about what the data represents — years of conversations, a relationship, a period of life. Android can't hold it the same way, and that feels like losing it.
You're not. You're relocating it into formats that belong to you instead of to Apple. The threads still exist. The voicemails still play. What changes is the container.
If you're interested in a more reflective piece on what your own extracted data can reveal — patterns in the record that memory edits out — we wrote about that on Medium. Not a how-to. A second read on your own archive, once you have it.
The one-line takeaway
Make one encrypted backup before you switch. Then you have all the time in the world to decide what to move, what to archive, and what to let go.
— OpenExtract