Are WhatsApp messages admissible in court in the UK? How to export and use them

Yes. WhatsApp messages are used as evidence every day in the civil courts, the family court and employment tribunals in England and Wales. Whether they help you depends less on the rules than on how you export and present them.

Jump to: admissibility · hearsay · screenshots · exporting a chat · PDF exhibits · presenting it · FAQ

Are WhatsApp messages admissible in UK courts?

Yes. No rule in England and Wales excludes WhatsApp messages because they are digital. Civil courts (including the small claims track), the family court and employment tribunals regularly rely on them to prove what was agreed, what was said, when someone was told about a problem, or how a person behaved over time.

Admissible does not mean persuasive. Three tests decide how much your messages help:

• Relevance. They must go to an issue the court actually has to decide. Courts can exclude evidence that would otherwise be admissible (CPR 32.1 in civil cases, FPR 22.1 in family cases).
• Authenticity. The court must accept that they are genuine, unedited and came from the person you say sent them. A signed witness statement, a complete export and the phone itself are usually enough unless the other side disputes it.
• Fair presentation. Show the relevant conversation in full and in date order, not just the lines that help you. Cherry-picking is the fastest way to lose credibility.

The procedure differs by forum: civil claims follow the Civil Procedure Rules (CPR), the family court the Family Procedure Rules 2010 (FPR), and employment tribunals their own, more flexible rules. Only use conversations you were part of or were lawfully given; getting into someone else's phone or account can be unlawful.

Criminal cases work differently. If messages show a crime, such as threats or harassment, report it to the police. The police gather the evidence and the Crown Prosecution Service decides what goes before the court under the criminal rules of evidence, so you do not prepare your own exhibit.

This guide covers England and Wales; Scotland and Northern Ireland have separate courts and their own rules of evidence.

Are WhatsApp messages hearsay?

Often, yes, but in civil and family cases that rarely matters. Hearsay is a statement made outside the witness box that is put forward to prove that what it says is true. A landlord's message saying "I've kept the deposit for the carpet", relied on to prove why the deposit was kept, is hearsay. A message relied on only to show that something was said, such as that you reported damp on a certain date, is not.

Civil proceedings: the Civil Evidence Act 1995

Section 1 of the Civil Evidence Act 1995 says that in civil proceedings evidence "shall not be excluded on the ground that it is hearsay". Two safeguards remain:

• Notice (section 2). Under CPR 33.2, if the hearsay is in the witness statement of someone giving evidence, typically you exhibiting the messages, serving that statement as the court ordered counts as notice. Otherwise, serve a hearsay notice by the deadline for witness statements. Missing it does not make the evidence inadmissible, but it can count against you on costs and weight.
• Weight (section 4). The court considers things like whether the statement was made at the time, whether anyone had a motive to misrepresent, and whether it is an edited account. Complete, unedited, contemporaneous messages do well.

CPR Part 33 does not apply on the small claims track (CPR 27.2); follow your directions order instead.

Family proceedings

The 1995 Act also applies in family proceedings, and FPR Part 23 has matching notice rules. Those rules do not apply to evidence covered by the Children (Admissibility of Hearsay Evidence) Order 1993, which makes evidence given in connection with the upbringing, maintenance or welfare of a child admissible despite any rule about hearsay. In children cases the argument is about weight, not admissibility.

Employment tribunals

Rule 41 of the Employment Tribunal Procedure Rules 2024 says the tribunal "is not bound by any rule of law relating to the admissibility of evidence in proceedings before the courts". Other tribunals are generally flexible too, but check the procedure rules for yours.

Why WhatsApp screenshots get challenged

Screenshots are the easiest evidence to attack. They can be cropped to hide the message that changes the meaning. They are easy to fake with free websites, and judges know it. They show the contact name as you saved it, which proves nothing about who actually sent the message. And a handful of them invites the obvious question: what did you leave out?

Neither the FPR 2010 nor the CPR has a special rule about screenshots; the court decides their weight like any other document. They are still the right tool when the other person has switched on WhatsApp's Advanced Chat Privacy (which blocks exporting), when you need to show how something looked on screen, such as a "This message was deleted" notice or the contact page linking a name to a number, or when the exchange is short and not disputed.

Take overlapping shots of the whole relevant exchange, with dates and names visible and nothing cropped or annotated, and keep the originals. A screen recording scrolling through the chat from the contact page helps show continuity. Keep the phone in case the court wants to see the device.

How to export a WhatsApp chat for court

WhatsApp's built-in Export Chat creates a text record of the conversation, with dates, times and sender names, plus the photos, videos, voice notes and documents if you choose to include them.

On iPhone

1. Open the individual or group chat.
2. Tap the contact's name or the group name at the top of the screen.
3. Scroll down and tap Export Chat.
4. If the chat contains media, choose Attach Media or Without Media.
5. Save it to Files, AirDrop it to your computer or email it to yourself. The export is created as a .zip file.

On Android

1. Open the chat.
2. Tap ⋮ (More options) › More › Export chat.
3. Tap Include media or Without media.
4. Choose where to send it, such as Google Drive or email. Depending on your phone and WhatsApp version you will get a .zip, or a .txt file with the media files alongside it; keep them together.

Include media if photos, voice notes or documents matter to your case; each file's name appears in the chat text where it was sent. Without media gives a smaller, text-only record.

Size caps and other limits

• Message caps. WhatsApp's help pages previously quoted a cap of about 10,000 of the latest messages with media and 40,000 without, so the oldest messages in a long chat can drop off. The current pages give no figures, so check that the first message in your export goes back far enough; exporting without media may reach further.
• Missing content. WhatsApp says view-once messages are not exported, and messages that have already disappeared or been deleted won't be there.
• Advanced Chat Privacy. If the other person has switched it on for the chat, you will see a "Can't export chat" message. Use careful screenshots instead.
• WhatsApp Desktop and Web. At the time of writing, Export Chat is only in the iPhone and Android apps. Export on the phone, then move the file to your computer.

Keep the original untouched

• Save one copy somewhere safe and never rename, open-and-save or edit it. Work only from a second copy.
• Note when you exported, from which phone, and whether media was included.
• Record its SHA-256 hash, a digital fingerprint that changes if a single character changes. On a Mac, run shasum -a 256 followed by the file name in Terminal; on Windows, run certutil -hashfile followed by the file name and SHA256 in Command Prompt.
• Keep the phone and don't delete the chat. If the export is ever challenged, the device is the ultimate source.

Turning the export into a PDF exhibit

A raw export is a long text file with file names where the photos should be. The court needs an exhibit it can page through and cite. Aim for:

• Chronological, unaltered text: oldest first, nothing reordered, paraphrased or corrected.
• Page numbers running consecutively at the bottom centre, as the practice directions on exhibits ask (PD 32 in civil cases, PD 22A in family cases).
• Photos next to the messages that sent them, not in an appendix (in the family court, only photos the court needs to see: see PD27A below).
• An exhibit mark on the first page (your initials and a number, such as JS1) and a front page listing the contents with dates.
• A provenance record: when and how you exported, from which phone, the date range and message count, and the hash of the original file.

Include only the relevant date range, but everything within it. If private material inside that range has to go, such as a third party's medical details, black it out visibly or mark it [redacted] and say so in your statement. Never silently delete lines. In the family court, follow PD27A instead: select only the specific messages you will refer to, unless your order says otherwise.

The manual route in Word

1. Unzip a copy of the export and open the chat .txt file in Word.
2. Delete messages outside your date range, and note the range you kept.
3. Find each photo's file name in the text and insert that image straight after it.
4. Redact by replacing words with [redacted], or with a black box over deleted text. Highlighting alone leaves the words selectable in the PDF.
5. Add a front page with the exhibit mark and contents, and centred page numbers in the footer.
6. Save as PDF and check every page.

On a chat with hundreds of photos this can take hours, and it is easy to put an image in the wrong place.

Using Chat2Court

Chat2Court is a free web tool (no account, and no payment during early access) that does the formatting in your browser. Load the .zip or chat .txt from WhatsApp's Export Chat on iPhone or Android (if Android gave you a .txt with separate media files, put them all into one .zip first so the photos can be matched), and it produces a chronological, paginated A4 PDF with:

• photos shown next to the messages that sent them, with any missing media flagged;
• date-range and sender filters, and the option to exclude individual messages;
• an optional contents page, page numbers, provenance page and UK family-court style caption (court, case number, parties and exhibit reference);
• a provenance sheet with the SHA-256 hash of your export and a plain-English method statement, plus a manifest.json recording every media file's hash and the filters applied.

Colour emoji and iPhone HEIC photos are supported. Your chat, media and hashes are never uploaded, and once the page shows its Offline-ready marker it works in Aeroplane Mode. It has no redaction tool, so redact visibly yourself. It doesn't handle SMS, iMessage or email, doesn't send or file anything with anyone, can't verify that a conversation is genuine, and isn't legal advice.

Presenting WhatsApp evidence to the court

Exhibit it to your witness statement

In civil claims and tribunals, messages come in as an exhibit to your witness statement, which explains who the people are, how you know the number is theirs, how you exported the chat, and which messages matter. In the family court, check your order: PD27A says statements in the bundle should not exhibit or duplicate WhatsApp messages, so refer to the specific messages and include only those the court needs to read.

Practice Direction 32 says an exhibit should be verified and identified by the witness and kept separate from the statement, and referred to in the form "I refer to the (description of exhibit) marked '…'". For example: "I refer to the WhatsApp messages between me and the Defendant from 3 March to 28 April 2025, exported from my phone on 10 May 2025, marked JS1." Exhibit numbers run consecutively across your statements, and the family equivalent, PD 22A, has matching rules. Cite pages: "JS1, page 14". Copies can be exhibited if the originals are available for inspection (PD32 para 13.1; PD22A has the same rule). For a chat, offer the untouched export file, which your hash lets you prove is unchanged. Keep the messages on your phone in case the court directs that they be checked. You do not have to hand your phone to the other side without agreement or a court order.

Family court bundles: the 2026 PD27A

A new Practice Direction 27A on family court bundles came into force on 2 March 2026. For WhatsApp evidence:

• The bundle may contain only documents that are relevant and that the court needs to read or will actually be referred to.
• Emails, text messages, WhatsApp messages and social media communications must not be included unless the court directs otherwise, though specific messages the court needs to read, or that will actually be referred to, can go in. Statements should not exhibit or duplicate them.
• The same default exclusion covers photographs and voice notes or other recordings (PD27A para 5.2(c) and (h)). Include only specific ones the judge needs to see. Never include intimate or sexually explicit images without the court's written permission (see the judiciary's March 2026 guide for litigants in person and Re M [2022] EWHC 986 (Fam)).
• An e-bundle is limited to 350 A4 pages without the court's permission, and a witness statement to 25 pages, excluding exhibits.

So read your latest order, include only the messages you will take the judge to, and ask for a direction if the court needs to see more. The judiciary's March 2026 bundle guide for litigants in person explains this plainly. Normally the applicant prepares the bundle, but if the applicant is unrepresented and the respondent has a lawyer, the respondent's side does.

Civil courts and tribunals

• Small claims. The formal disclosure and evidence rules in CPR Parts 31 to 33 mostly do not apply. Follow your directions order on what to send and when.
• Other civil claims. Standard disclosure (CPR 31.6) covers documents that harm your case as well as those that help it, unless the court orders otherwise, and the other side may inspect documents mentioned in your witness statement (CPR 31.14). A party given a document on disclosure is taken to accept it is authentic unless they serve notice that they want it proved at trial. The notice must be served by the latest date for serving witness statements, or within 7 days of disclosure, whichever is later (CPR 32.19; FPR 22.16 in family cases). This works both ways: if you think the other side's screenshots are edited or fake, serve that notice in time.
• Employment tribunals. Case management orders set disclosure and the hearing bundle, usually a single agreed one.

Serve it, and keep the phone

Serve and file your statement and exhibits as your order directs. Be ready to give the other side a copy of the export file; your hash shows it matches what you exported. Consider bringing the phone to the hearing if authenticity is disputed. Don't switch phones, reset it or delete the chat until the case, including any appeal, is over.

Frequently asked questions

Can WhatsApp messages be used in court in the UK?

Yes. WhatsApp messages are legal evidence and are regularly used in civil courts, the family court and employment tribunals in England and Wales, provided they are relevant, genuine and fairly presented. In civil claims that is usually a complete export exhibited to your witness statement. In the family court, Practice Direction 27A means only the specific messages the judge needs to read go in the bundle, unless the court directs otherwise.

Are text messages hearsay?

A message relied on to prove that what it says is true is hearsay, but hearsay is admissible in civil and family proceedings under the Civil Evidence Act 1995. A message used only to show that something was said, such as a repair report, is not being used as hearsay. The real question is how much weight the court gives it.

How do I submit WhatsApp messages as evidence in court?

Export the chat, turn the relevant date range into a paginated PDF exhibit marked with your initials and a number, such as JS1, and refer to it in your witness statement. Serve and file it as your order directs. In the family court, check Practice Direction 27A and your order first.

Are WhatsApp screenshots accepted in family court?

They can be. The Family Procedure Rules 2010 have no special rule for screenshots and the court decides their weight, but because screenshots are easy to crop or fake, a complete export is stronger. If you must use them, capture the whole exchange without cropping.

How do I record WhatsApp messages as evidence for court?

Use Export Chat on your phone rather than copying messages by hand. Keep the original export untouched, note when you made it, record its SHA-256 hash, and keep the phone and the chat. Prepare your exhibit from a copy.

How do I convert a WhatsApp chat to PDF for court?

Export the chat with media, then either build the PDF in Word, inserting each photo after its message and adding page numbers, or use a tool such as Chat2Court, which builds a chronological, paginated PDF in your browser.

Can I export a WhatsApp chat from WhatsApp Web or the desktop app?

Not at the time of writing. Export Chat is only in the iPhone and Android apps, so export on your phone and then move the file to your computer.

What if WhatsApp says it can't export the chat?

Usually the other person has switched on Advanced Chat Privacy for that conversation, which blocks exporting. Take careful, complete screenshots or a screen recording instead, and keep the messages on your phone.

Do I have to include the whole WhatsApp conversation?

No. In civil claims, don't cherry-pick: include the relevant period in full, redact visibly, and be ready to produce the full export. In many claims you must also disclose messages that harm your case. In the family court the default is the opposite: under Practice Direction 27A, WhatsApp messages stay out of the bundle unless the court directs otherwise, or unless specific messages are ones the judge needs to read or will be taken to. Keep the full export ready in case the court or the other side asks for it.