How to Search in WhatsApp Chats and Groups

WhatsApp includes basic search functionality, but it is very limited and far from enough for many WhatsApp users out there. In this tutorial, we’ll see how to search WhatsApp chats and groups efficiently, quickly, and without limitations. We’ll cover:

• WhatsApp Search Tools
• WhatsApp Search Basics
• Search WhatsApp by Phone Number
• Search WhatsApp by Name
• Find WhatsApp Group Messages By Sender
• Search All WhatsApp Groups

WhatsApp Search Tool

Since WhatsApp’s own search capabilities are quite limited (according to WhatsApp’s search documentation), we will be using a WhatsApp companion tool, WHAMetrics Companion. It’s an app that you install and connect to your WhatsApp, and it then allows you to perform advanced tasks on your WhatsApp data – effective search being one of them (it also does WhatsApp analytics, WhatsApp task management and ToDo, and additional capabilities, but we’ll focus on search in this tutorial).

Get WHAMetrics Companion here, and continue with the tutorial below.

WhatsApp Search Basics

Once you connect WHAMetrics Companion to your WhatsApp, you can immediately see your messages (both regular chats and groups) in the WHAMetrics console.

This immediately allows you to search your WhatsApp chats and groups, and to apply a variety of filters and advanced search capabilities.

Let’s see a few examples.

Search WhatsApp by Phone Number

Want to easily find WhatsApp messages by phone number? Here is how to do that:

1. In WHAMetrics companion,go to the Messages tab
2. Type the number in the “Name” field (or even part of a name).
3. This will immediately filter messages only from that name.
4. You can apply additional filters as well – such as search for messages that are from that name and contain specific words, specific times and so on

Oh, and if you looking for mentions of that name instead, just type it in the “message” field, and you’ll get messages that include that name in their text.

Search WhatsApp By Name

What if you need to find messages by name, not phone number? Not a problem – here is how that is done:

1. In WHAMetrics companion, go to the Messages tab
2. Type the name in the “Phone” field.
3. This will immediately filter messages only from that number.
4. You can apply additional filters as well – such as search for messages that are from that number and contain specific words, specific times and so on

Find WhatsApp Group Messages By Sender

Got a group with tons of messages, and only want to see messages by a specific person? Here is how to do that:

1. In WHAMetrics companion, go to the Messages tab.
2. Select the group that you want.
3. In the message list below, type the person’s name in the “Name” field – or their number in the “Phone” field.
4. You now see all the messages for that specific person.
5. You can apply additional filters as well – such as search for messages that are from a specific sender and also contain specific words, specific words (e.g. “I remember it was a message from Frank about his vacation, but can’t find it…”)

Select that group in WHAMetrics console, and and the person’s name in the “Name” field (or you can enter their number into “Phone” field). You now have all the messages for that specific person.

Search All WhatsApp Groups

What if you don’t remember which group to search? (e.g. “I remember it was a message from Jim and it was about France, but I can’t remember which group it was sent in”)

Or, maybe you want to search all of your groups for mentions of an event, or a specific term? (e.g. “find all recommendations for HVAC techs ever mentioned in any group”)

Using WHAMetrics companion, you can search multiple groups just as easy as searching a single group. Here is how:

1. In WHAMetrics companion, go to the Messages tab.
2. Select the groups that you want to search, or just select all groups.
3. Now, search / filter messages same as in a single group – only this time, you get to see messages from all of selected groups!

Ready to supercharge WhatsApp search?

Get WHAMetrics Companion