Turn your iMessage history into a keepsake you read together.
Your iMessage history lives in one file on your Mac — chat.db, tucked inside ~/Library/Messages. It's the plain record of years of good-mornings, drive-safes, and you up? at 2 a.m. Story of Us reads that file on your own screen and turns it into a short keepsake built from your actual words — not a template with your names swapped in.
What you'll need
iMessage only exports from a Mac — there's no way to pull full message history straight off an iPhone. Open Finder, press Cmd+Shift+G, paste in ~/Library/Messages, and that's where chat.db lives. The import screen walks through it step by step, including the Full Disk Access prompt macOS shows the first time an app reads that folder — or read the full iMessage export guide first.
What you get
A short, private keepsake built only from your own history — pet names and inside jokes it noticed on its own, your year-by-year rhythm, your busiest hour, the words you reach for without thinking. You read it on your screen, then you can download it as a PDF to keep or print yourself, no subscription and nothing shipped. It's ready in about a minute.
Privacy, plainly
The export itself never leaves your device — it's read right there in your browser, the same way a photo opens on your computer. To write the handful of captions that need real words (your busiest year, your first exchange, the phrase you didn't know you repeated), we send a much smaller slice to our server: your most-used words and phrases, counts and rhythms (who texts more, your streaks, your busiest hour), and a very small handful of sample messages — your first few texts and your most recent. Not the export file, not your full conversation. Read exactly what we send →
Where this doesn't work
- Mac only — there's no equivalent export path from an iPhone or iPad alone.
- Built for one-on-one texting. A group thread's
chat.dbusually won't parse into a clean two-person story. - If Messages isn't set to keep history "Forever," older years may already be gone from the file before you ever export it.
Make our iMessage keepsake $5 · one time · stays on your laptop
Talk on WhatsApp instead? Make a WhatsApp keepsake →
Questions
Do I need my partner's Mac too, or just mine?
Just yours. chat.db already holds both sides of every conversation you've had with them, so one Mac is enough.
Can I do this from my iPhone instead?
No — iOS doesn't expose a way to export full message history, so a Mac is required for iMessage specifically. WhatsApp and Messenger both export from a phone.
Will this change or delete anything in Messages?
No. The app only reads chat.db in your browser to build the keepsake; nothing is written back to your Mac or deleted.
Is the result a physical printed book?
No — it's a private page you read on screen. You can download it as a PDF afterward and print it yourself if you'd like a physical copy.
What if our history is years old and huge?
That's fine — chat.db is read locally in your browser regardless of size, and only small phrases, counts, and a handful of sample messages are sent along for the captions.