How to Transfer Data From Android to an iPhone (2026)

Transferring data from Android to iPhone is mostly a one-app job, thanks to Apple’s free Move to iOS app. It pulls your photos, contacts, messages, and free apps across during setup. The trick is knowing what it doesn’t carry, like WhatsApp chats and paid apps.

#What Does Move to iOS Actually Transfer?

This is the question that saves you grief later. Apple’s Move to iOS guide confirms that the two phones pair with a 6-digit or 10-digit code over a temporary Wi-Fi network, then copy your content across.

The list is generous: contacts, messages, photos and videos, albums, files, settings, bookmarks, mail accounts, even WhatsApp media.

But it isn’t everything.

Matching free apps reinstall from the App Store if they exist on both platforms, while music, books, and PDFs need a manual move. Knowing this split upfront is the whole game, because it tells you exactly what to handle yourself after the automated part finishes. If the app stalls midway, our guide to Move to iOS not working covers the common fixes.

#Before You Start: Prepare Both Phones

A few minutes of prep prevents a failed transfer halfway through. Plug both phones into power, since the process can take a while and a dead battery cancels everything.

Connect both to Wi-Fi, or have a USB-C cable ready for a faster wired transfer.

Make sure your new iPhone has enough free storage for everything coming over, and update Chrome on the Android phone if you want bookmarks to carry. When we tested a transfer from a Pixel to an iPhone, plugging both into power and using a cable cut the time roughly in half compared with Wi-Fi. It’s also smart to confirm your new iPhone can back up afterward, which our notes on iPhone iCloud backup help with.

#How to Use Move to iOS Step by Step

The flow is built into iPhone setup, so timing matters. On the new iPhone, work through setup until you reach the Transfer Your Apps & Data screen, then tap Move Data from Android.

On the Android phone, install Move to iOS from the Play Store and open it.

Tap Continue on both devices, agree to the terms, and the iPhone shows a code. Enter that 6-digit or 10-digit code on the Android phone, and the two connect over a temporary private Wi-Fi network. Now pick what to transfer, photos, messages, contacts, and the rest, then tap and wait.

Leave both phones alone until the loading bar on the iPhone finishes, not the Android one.

In our testing, the Android side often looked done first, but tapping away early left photos missing. Once the iPhone bar completes, set up the rest of your iPhone normally. From there, features like Focus mode on iPhone are worth configuring while everything’s fresh.

#What If You Already Finished iPhone Setup?

You don’t have to erase the iPhone and start over. Move to iOS only runs during initial setup, but the data it would have moved can be backfilled through cloud services and apps.

Start with photos.

According to Google Photos backup help, photos backed up to your Google account are accessible from any device where you sign in, which means installing the Google Photos app on the iPhone brings your whole library along. Contacts and calendar sync the same way: add your Google account in the iPhone’s Settings under Mail or Contacts, and they appear. For everything app-based, you simply reinstall from the App Store and sign in again.

#Moving What Move to iOS Skips

This is where most of the manual work lives, and WhatsApp is the headliner. WhatsApp’s Android-to-iPhone transfer guide states that you start the move during iPhone setup with both phones nearby and the same phone number.

Miss that window and the chat history is hard to recover, so plan it deliberately.

Paid apps are the next gap: they don’t transfer as purchases, so you re-buy or re-download them from the App Store, where many honor an existing subscription once you sign in. DRM-protected movies and some music won’t carry over either, meaning you re-download them from their apps. If your new iPhone gets stuck during all this shuffling, our guide to an iPhone stuck on the Apple logo can help you recover.

#Reinstalling Apps and Wiping the Old Phone

Apps come over as reinstalls, not working copies. Move to iOS flags which of your Android apps have iPhone versions and queues the free ones from the App Store, but you still sign in to each.

Budget time for logins and two-factor prompts.

Banking apps, authenticators, and anything with strong security will ask you to verify again, so keep your old phone handy until every important account is confirmed on the iPhone. Once you’re sure everything landed, sign out of accounts on the Android phone and do a factory reset before selling or recycling it. Switching back someday? Our companion guide to transferring data from iPhone to Android covers the reverse trip.

#Bottom Line

Run Move to iOS during initial iPhone setup for the cleanest result, then treat WhatsApp, paid apps, and DRM media as separate manual jobs. If you already finished setup, you don’t have to erase the iPhone: use Google Photos, your Google account sync, and the App Store to backfill instead of redoing everything. Keep both phones charged and nearby, let the iPhone’s progress bar finish, and the whole switch usually wraps up in well under an hour.

#Frequently Asked Questions