Manual method
- In X on a computer, select More, Settings and privacy, Your account, then Download an archive of your data.
- Complete the account’s normal identity verification and request the archive.
- Wait for the email or in-app notification, then download while signed in to the same account.
- Extract the ZIP and open its HTML entry page. Retain the machine-readable files and media folders beside it.
What you get: X documents a snapshot including posts, DMs, media and account/relationship records. Check actual attachment coverage and open the archive offline. It is not a replay of all posts you ever viewed or a guarantee of deleted-history recovery. Provider instructions.
Size and waiting time
Planning example: 2 GB; light/heavy scenarios: 0.05–20 GB. These are estimates, not a measured population average or fixed limits. Several years of text posts and DMs plus hundreds of pictures and short clips; a mostly-text archive may be much smaller.
Preparation: X says preparation can take a few days. Download promptly and follow any expiry in the notice.
Network transfer of 2 GB: about 38 min at 10 Mbps, 8 min at 50 Mbps, or 4 min at 100 Mbps. This assumes 70% sustained throughput and excludes preparation, manual work and extraction. These are download estimates; online backup takes additional time at your upload speed. Transfer calculations and large-file examples.
Store and check your archive
An encrypted external SSD or hard drive is a good main archive for this collection. Allow roughly 6 GB of working space for the example, including an original, an extracted working copy and room to check it. Very compressed packages can need more. A USB key is useful for a spare copy, but should not be the only one. An encrypted online copy protects against losing the local devices.
Keep the original in x/YYYY-MM-DD/original/. Record the account alias, selected scope, date range and missing items. Open old and recent records and sample attachments offline, then compare file sizes or checksums after copying. Keep the source account until you have checked the result. Storage and recovery instructions.
Sources and review
Public documentation was reviewed on 27 October 2026. No signed-in export or restoration was performed. Account options and availability can change; follow the current provider instructions.