How to export your Character.AI chats—and what the Chapter 11 update means
Back up your Character.AI chats on web or mobile, understand the Chapter 11 announcement, and keep export, account deletion, and subscription cancellation separate.
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Character.AI has an official data export option on both the web and its mobile app. If you want to keep your conversations before trying another service, start by requesting an export and checking what you receive.
Exporting your data, deleting your account, and cancelling a subscription are separate tasks. You do not need to delete your account just to request a backup.
The company's October 12, 2026 announcement also gives users a reason to review their backups. Character.AI announced a voluntary Chapter 11 process and a court-supervised sale. That announcement is not a confirmed shutdown date. Here is what it says, followed by the official export steps.
Cover: AI-generated illustration, not a screenshot or an example of the export format.
What Character.AI announced
In its October 12 update, Character.AI said it had started a Chapter 11 process to pursue a court-supervised sale of the company.
The company described legal, regulatory, and operational pressures and said the sale process offered its best opportunity to preserve value and allow the platform to continue operating.
Continued operation is not guaranteed, however. The announcement says the company hopes to receive an actionable proposal that would allow the platform to continue, and that the platform would be wound down if such a bid is unavailable.
Character.AI said it expected the sale process to finish by the end of November or possibly early December 2026. That is an estimate for the sale process, not an announced date for the service to close.
What the update says about access, billing, and chats
The following points describe the October 12 announcement. Check the official update for later notices before making decisions about an account or subscription.
The platform was still operating
The announcement says the platform remained up and running and users could still access all services at that time. Starting Chapter 11 did not mean that access ended immediately.
It also did not establish that the service would continue indefinitely. The company made continued operation dependent on the outcome of the sale process.
Paid subscriptions remained active
Character.AI said subscriptions remained active and billing was unchanged for the time being. It also said it intended to notify subscribers in advance if service changes affected paid features.
Do not assume that the announcement automatically cancels a paid plan. If you want to stop paying, check how to manage the subscription through the place where you purchased it.
Users could still request their data
The announcement says its data privacy and security practices were unchanged and that users could export their data or delete their accounts through the website or app.
That statement should not be read as a guarantee of what will happen to every conversation after a future sale or shutdown. If there are chats you want to keep, request an export and verify the result rather than relying only on continued access to the account.
How to export your Character.AI data
Character.AI's official export guide lists different menu paths for the website and the mobile app.
On the website
- Open your Profile.
- Select Profile Settings.
- Go to Account.
- Open Manage Account & Data.
- Select Export data.
The account management area also includes Delete Account. Choose Export data if your goal is to save your data, not remove the account.
Web export path, based on the official export guide. Explanatory diagram, not a screenshot.
In the mobile app
- Open your Profile.
- Select the settings icon.
- Select Export my data.
The official guide uses Export my data for the app and Export data for the website. The labels are not identical.
App export path, based on the official export guide. Explanatory diagram, not a screenshot.
After making the request, check that you receive the export, that it contains the conversations you wanted to keep, and that you can access your saved copy. Submitting a request is not the same as confirming that your backup is complete.
Exporting, deleting, and cancelling are different
| What you want to do | Action to look for | What to check |
|---|---|---|
| Keep a copy of your data | Export data or Export my data | Confirm that you received the data and can access the saved copy |
| Remove your account | Delete Account or Remove Account | Account deletion is permanent |
| Stop a paid subscription | Subscription management through the original billing provider | Check whether you subscribed through the website, App Store, or Google Play |
Different actions, based on the official guides to exporting, account deletion, and c.ai+ subscriptions. Explanatory diagram, not a screenshot.
Account deletion cannot be undone
Character.AI's account deletion guide says deletion is permanent and cannot be reversed. It lists Delete Account on the web and Remove Account in the mobile app.
If you are considering deletion, check your export first. Do not delete the account on the assumption that an exported file can restore the original account or put every conversation back into the service.
Cancel a subscription through the correct provider
The official c.ai+ subscription guide separates subscriptions purchased on the website from those purchased in an app.
For a website subscription, it directs users to Settings → Account → Manage and the Customer Portal. If the plan is managed by an app store, use that store's subscription management instead.
For subscriptions purchased through Apple's App Store or Google Play, follow the relevant store's instructions. The linked guide is specifically for c.ai+; check your own plan and billing provider if you use another subscription.
Requesting a data export does not replace the subscription cancellation process.
Keep your backup private
An export may contain personal conversations. Before placing it in a shared folder or creating a public link, check who can access that location.
If you want to move to another AI chat service, distinguish between keeping an archive and importing a conversation. An export does not, by itself, guarantee that another service can resume the same chat or recover the character's memory.
Check the destination service's supported formats and privacy terms before uploading a conversation file. Keep a private copy of the original export, and do not assume that an external conversion tool needs access to all of your chats.
