How to save a parent's voicemails before they disappear

Most of us have one. A voicemail from Mum saying she's just checking in, or Dad ringing to say happy birthday, slightly too loud, as if the phone were a long way off. You never meant to keep it. It's just still there.

Then one day you realise it's the only recording you have of their voice saying your name, and you start to worry about losing it.

That worry is reasonable. Voicemails are more fragile than they look. The good news is that saving one properly takes about five minutes. This guide walks through how to do it on an iPhone or Android phone, what to do if you can only dial in to listen, how to keep the file safe for years, and how to gather more of a parent's voice while they're still here.

Why voicemails go missing

A voicemail feels like it lives on your phone. Often it doesn't, or not only there.

Apple's own iPhone guide to checking voicemail says messages are saved until you delete them, or until your carrier erases them if they aren't stored in iCloud. It also warns that in some countries or regions, deleted messages may be permanently erased by your carrier, and that voice messages may be deleted if you change your SIM card.

Android has similar catches. Google's help page on checking voicemail in the Phone app notes that if you turn off a SIM, the cached data for that SIM is deleted. It also says that if you turn off voicemail transcription, the recordings and transcriptions in the Phone app are deleted.

Carriers also set their own rules about how long messages are kept on their side, and those rules vary. So the safest assumption is simple: until a voicemail exists as a file you control, it can vanish with a new phone, a new SIM, a changed setting or a change of plan.

Saving a voicemail on an iPhone

If your voicemail tab shows a list of messages you can tap and play, you have Visual Voicemail, and saving is easy.

1. Open the Phone app.
2. Find the message. Depending on your layout, tap Voicemail, or tap Calls and filter to voicemails.
3. Tap the message, then tap the Share button.
4. Choose where to send it. Voice Memos, Notes, Files or Mail (to yourself) all work.

Apple lists sharing as one of the standard options for a voicemail in the same guide. How-To Geek notes that the saved file comes out in M4A format, which most audio players can open, and that this method needs Visual Voicemail. If you have to dial a number to hear your messages, skip ahead to the section on recording it yourself.

My suggestion is to send it to two places straight away: Voice Memos on the phone, and an email to yourself. That way you have a copy off the phone within a minute.

Saving a voicemail on Android

Android phones vary more, because manufacturers and carriers use different phone apps. If you use Google's Phone app (the default on Pixel phones and many others), Google's voicemail help page describes it like this:

1. Open the Phone app.
2. Tap Voicemail at the bottom.
3. Expand the voicemail you want to keep.
4. Tap Send to, then choose an app, such as Google Drive, Gmail or a file manager.

If you don't see a Voicemail tab, Google says to call your voicemail instead, which means your messages live with your carrier. Some phones come with a carrier's own visual voicemail app that has a save or share option of its own. Look for a share icon or a three-dot menu on the message.

If you can only dial in to listen

Older phones, landlines and some plans don't give you a file at all. You can still save the message.

• Put the phone that plays the message on speaker in a quiet room.
• Use a second device to record: another phone's voice memo app, a laptop, or a small recorder.
• Place the recording device close to the speaker, on a soft surface like a cushion so it doesn't pick up table rattle.
• Do a ten-second test first and play it back before you record the real thing.

It won't be studio quality. It will be their voice, safely in a file, and that's what matters. If the message is on a landline answering machine, the same trick works. Record it before anyone unplugs the machine or tidies the house.

Back it up properly

One copy on one phone is barely better than none. The Library of Congress has clear, plain guidance on keeping personal digital audio, and it applies neatly here:

• Keep at least two copies, and more is better. One can be on your computer, others on a portable drive, a USB stick or online storage.
• Store copies in different places, as far apart as practical. A drive in your desk and a copy in the cloud is a good start. A USB stick at a sibling's house is even better.
• Name and describe your files, and write a short note about what you have and where it's kept. Keep that note with your important papers.
• Check once a year that you can still play the recordings.
• Make fresh copies every five years, or sooner if a drive is getting old.

For a voicemail, a good file name tells a future reader everything at a glance. Something like 2019-03-14 Mum voicemail - birthday call.m4a is much more useful than Voicemail 37.

Write down what you know about it

A recording without context loses meaning over time. Your children may not know why Grandad's message about the boiler makes everyone laugh.

Alongside the file, jot down a few lines:

• who it's from and the date, if you know it
• where they were, or what was going on in their life
• why it matters to you
• a rough transcript, word for word, including the "erm"s

The transcript is worth doing. Audio formats change, and a written version is something any future device can read.

If your parent has died

Grief makes admin hard, and it's easy to cancel a phone contract before anyone has checked what's on the phone. If you can, pause before closing their mobile or landline account.

• Check their phone for voicemails they saved from other people. Sometimes the voices of their own parents or friends are in there.
• Check any answering machine in the house.
• Check their own outgoing greeting. Ringing their number and recording the "Hi, you've reached..." message is another way to keep their voice.

If your parent used an iPhone and had set you up as a Legacy Contact, Apple explains how this works in its Legacy Contact guide. A Legacy Contact can request access to data in the person's Apple Account, which can include photos, messages, notes, files and device backups. To do so, you need the access key that was created when you were added, plus a death certificate. It doesn't cover passwords or payment details.

Which leads to one practical step for the living: if you'd want your family to be able to reach your own recordings and photos one day, it's worth setting this up for yourself, and quietly suggesting it to your parents.

If they're still here, record more on purpose

Voicemails are accidents. They catch a parent on an ordinary day saying ordinary things, which is part of why they're so precious. But you don't have to rely on accidents.

Some ideas that take a few minutes each:

• Ask them to say your name, and your children's names, the way only they say them.
• Ask for a short message for a future birthday or wedding.
• Ask them to read a favourite poem, a prayer, or the bedtime story they used to read to you.
• Ask them to talk you through a recipe they've made for years.
• Ask one good question and just let them talk. "What was your first job, and how did you get it?" is enough for ten minutes.

Keep it light. Most people feel awkward being recorded, so it helps to say why: "I love hearing your voice, and I want the kids to know it too."

You can record over the phone on a call recorder, or sit together with a phone on the table between you. A quiet room with curtains and a sofa sounds much better than a kitchen with hard surfaces.

If you live far apart, you can also send questions and let them answer when they're ready. One way to do that is Eternix's Memory Circle: you write a few questions and send a private link from your own phone by WhatsApp, text or email. Your parent answers by voice or in writing with no account and no app, and the answers come back to you encrypted, so only you can read and hear them. You can start here for free and keep asking over time.

The five-minute version

If you only do one thing today, do this. Find the voicemail you'd hate to lose. Share it to a second app on your phone and email it to yourself. Then, sometime this week, save a copy somewhere that isn't your phone.

And if you can, ring your parent and leave the voicemail box alone for a bit. Have the conversation while you can.