WhatsApp Wrapped is a year-in-review that is built entirely on your phone. It reads nothing on a server, shows you your year, and leaves your phone only as a card you choose to send.
Role
Concept, product & motion design
Made in
Lagos, Nigeria
Year
2026
01 · The demand
People already want this. They're getting it from strangers.
#1
Lifestyle chart in the App Store, reached by WA Wrapped, an unofficial third-party recap app.
~€6
The subscription that app asks for before showing the full analysis.
0
Official WhatsApp recaps. WhatsApp has never shipped a year-in-review.
Users hand over their chats
Every third-party tool asks you to export a conversation and upload it to someone else's app.
The good part is paywalled
Free to download, pay to see your own year.
The numbers can't be trusted
One app showed screenshot counts. WhatsApp doesn't track screenshots, and reviewers questioned where the figure came from.
02 · The insight
WhatsApp can't read your messages. That's the whole idea.
Messages and calls are end-to-end encrypted, so WhatsApp can't see their content. Every other Wrapped is built on a company knowing what you did. This one is built on WhatsApp not knowing, and makes that the moment of delight.
Every other WrappedWe know what you listened to.
Computed on servers from your history.
WhatsApp WrappedOnly you know what you said.
Computed on your phone. Nothing new is sent anywhere.
Why now: trust in private messaging is under scrutiny in 2026, including a lawsuit over WhatsApp's encryption claims, which Meta rejects. A feature that visibly proves privacy is worth more than another feature that asks for trust.
03 · How it works
The whole Wrapped lives inside the phone.
On your phone
Your chats
Already stored on the device and encrypted end to end. Nothing is uploaded.
On-device Wrapped engine
Counts messages, voice-note minutes, top words and active hours, locally, in December.
Your Wrapped story
Nine animated cards. Seen only by you, deleted when you're done.
Optional You tap share. Only the summary card leaves, to your Status or Instagram Stories.
WhatsApp's servers
0
New pieces of message content received. The servers learn nothing they didn't already handle to deliver your messages.
Layer
What it shows
Example for Tolu
Computed
Activity counts
Messages sent, busiest day, most active hour, calls by country
48,312 messages · 1:47 am · 4 countries
On device
Language and voice
Most-typed words, top emoji, voice-note minutes
"Omohhh" ×2,104 · 61 hrs of voice notes
On device
Group roles
Playful personas from your behaviour in each group
The Voice Note Preacher, Family Meeting (Official)
On device
Shared recaps
A two-person recap that needs both people's consent
Tolu & Ada: who texts first
On both devices
04 · The story
Nine frames. One Lagos year.
Tolu is a fictional user from Yaba. Each frame pairs a stat with a behavioural hook, and the motion follows WhatsApp's own language: words that turn into bubbles, ticks that draw on, panels that wipe.
Trust
End-to-end yours
Open on the privacy promise before any number.
Achievement
48,312 sent
A big number that feels earned.
Surprise
61 hours of voice notes
Reframed as a podcast season.
Identity
Lagos in three phrases
Your words, ranked. The most shareable frame.
Belonging
Your group chat role
A persona the whole family will argue about.
Recognition
1:47 am
The hour that says who you are.
Connection
Four countries
The diaspora story only WhatsApp can tell.
Consent
Two-Key Wrapped
A shared recap that needs both keys.
Sharing
Omohhh, what a year.
One card leaves the phone, by choice.
05 · The behavioural experiment
Two-Key Wrapped
A recap of one chat between two people, such as who texts first, your shared emoji and your longest conversation. It opens only when both people turn their key, the same way an encrypted message needs both ends.
Hypothesis: asking for mutual consent creates curiosity ("Ada turned her key") and a reciprocal nudge, which should drive more opens and more re-engagement than a recap anyone can generate about anyone.
Unlock rate
Share of invites where the second key is turned.
Time to second key
How fast reciprocity happens.
Decline without blame
"Not now" never notifies the other person.
Proposed metrics for a test. No results yet.
06 · Design principles
Delight that never costs privacy.
Identity
Wrapped works because it says "this is who you were". Phrases, hours and roles do that without exposing content.
Belonging
Group roles and the cast list celebrate the people in your chats, shown only to you.
Reciprocity
Anything about two people needs two yeses. Nobody is featured without consent.
Local first
Every stat is computed on the phone, and every Lagos detail, from "Omohhh" to "japa", is the user's own.
07 · Launch
Ship it into WhatsApp's biggest night.
100B+
Messages WhatsApp handles on a typical day, alongside about 2 billion calls. The 24 hours around New Year beat that every year, which makes New Year's Eve the natural moment to share a recap.
Phones quietly build each user's Wrapped on the device.
Wrapped opens in Updates. Two-Key invites start going out.
Share-card moment: "Omohhh, what a year." on Status at midnight.
Wrapped is deleted from the phone. Nothing to keep, nothing to leak.
08 · Built in public
From Instagram Wrapped to WhatsApp Wrapped.
This started as an Instagram Wrapped concept, rebuilt in public after real-time feedback. WhatsApp Wrapped is the next experiment: same habit of shipping, then reshipping, applied to the most personal app on the phone.
Designed and animated in Lagos by the founder of MDX (Motion Design Xperience), a community for Africa's technical creatives. Motion follows WhatsApp's published brand language. The soundtrack and sound design are original.
Trust
Achievement
Surprise
Identity
Belonging
Recognition
Connection
Consent
Sharing