You can now change your Signal phone number and keep your chats

If you’re a Signal user, you’ve likely had to deal with porting your data to a new phone. Signal offers a tool that easily exports your encrypted chat history, allowing you to then import it on your new device.

See also: WhatsApp vs Telegram vs Signal

However, what if you want to change your Signal phone number? Since that’s basically the same as porting data from one account to a different account, it’s not been possible. Today, though, Signal is making this limitation a thing of the past.

Going forward, you can change your Signal phone number whenever you wish and still keep your data. This feature works on Android and iOS and will appear as an option with the latest stable release.

As a fun little detail, when you change your number, your friends will see a notification of it in your chats. It will even have a link so they can easily update your contact card so there’s no future confusion.

How to change your Signal phone number

To update your Signal phone number on Android, follow the steps below. You will need your phone that still has the ability to send and receive messages on Signal through your old number.

1. In the Signal app, tap on your profile image and then head to Account > Change phone number.
2. The app will alert you that you can’t undo this. Hit Continue to acknowledge the warning.
3. Enter your old number (the one currently attached to your Signal account) and your new number.
4. Hit Continue and then confirm everything looks correct.
5. Follow the instructions to set up Signal with your new number.