How to read Slack data exports

Once you’ve exported your workspace data, you can download a ZIP file to access message history and file links.  

Export formats

Your export format depends on the type of export that you run:

• Public channels only: Data will be exported in JSON format.
• All channels and conversations: Data will be exported in JSON format.
• Single user’s channels and conversations: Data can be exported in either JSON or TXT format.

What your export file contains

JSON files

TXT files

After your export is complete, you'll download a ZIP file with your workspace data and a series of file links that direct back to your workspace’s files. Depending on your export type, here’s what your ZIP file will include:

	Public channels only	All channels and conversations
Channels (channels.json)	✓	✓
Direct messages (dms.json)		✓
Private channels (groups.json)		✓
App activity logs (integration_logs.json)	✓	✓
Group direct messages (mpims.json)		✓
Members (users.json)*	✓	✓
Content flags† (content_flags.json)		✓
Folders for every public channel	✓	✓
Folders for every private channel		✓
Folders for every direct message		✓
A URL for every canvas (canvases.json)**	✓	✓

*If you export data from an Enterprise Grid organisation, this folder will be titled org_users.json
** If you export data from public channels only, this folder will only contain canvases shared in public channels. † Only available on Enterprise Grid subscriptions where content flagging is enabled.

Tip: on the Enterprise Grid subscription, you can choose to export data for your entire organisation or for a specific workspace. Exports for a specific workspace include public and private channels in the selected workspace, but not multi-workspace channels.

If you chose to export data for a single user’s conversations in TXT format, you’ll download a ZIP file with all the messages and files sent by the user that you selected once your export is complete. Your ZIP file will contain three folders:

• channels
• dms
• files

Each folder will include a set of TXT files containing the history of a conversation or the files sent by a single user during your selected date range.

Note: If you apply a date range to an export, Slack will return every conversation that the user has been part of, even if no messages were sent in that conversation during the dates that you selected. In this situation, the channel will not show any messages in the export file.

Navigate your export file

JSON files

TXT files

When you open your export ZIP file, each channel or direct message will have its own folder. Each folder will contain messages from the conversation, organised by date in separate JSON files.

You'll see reference files for different kinds of conversations: channels.json files for public channels, groups.json files for private channels and dms.json files for direct messages. These files will contain the user and channel IDs. You’ll need to use both the channel and reference files to find a specific conversation. For example, to find a specific message, you might do the following: 

1. Open the users.json file and search for the users in question. Make a note of their IDs. 
2. Next, open the channels.json, groups.json or dms.json file and search for the conversation that includes those two IDs in the members section. Make a note of the channel name or conversation ID for that conversation. 
3. In the main export folder, find the folder titled with that channel name or conversation ID. You’ll find multiple JSON files in that folder – one for each date that messages were sent.

Note: a folder will only be included in the export file if there are messages present for the date range that you’ve exported. For instance, if your retention policy is set to delete messages in public channels after 30 days and you select a date range over 31 days ago, there will be no folders for public channels included in your export.

Each folder in your ZIP file will contain different data from your workspace. The channels folder will include a TXT file of each channel and group direct message that a single user has been part of. The dms folder will include a TXT file of every one-to-one direct message that a single user has been part of.

TXT files for conversations will be named after the channel, or after the usernames of members in the direct message. For example, data for your #general channel will be in general.txt. Data for a direct message might be titled something like mcollins-jjordan.txt.

To view messages from a specific conversation, you might do the following:

1. Open the channels or dms folder.
2. Open the TXT file for the channel or direct message that you’d like to view.

Once you’ve opened the TXT file, you’ll see the conversation’s message history under the Messages header. Message history will include messages sent by the single user in your export and any other users in the conversation.

Note: Edited and deleted messages will only appear in your export file if your retention policy is set to keep them.

How to read messages 

JSON files

TXT files

Every message will include the following fields:

• "type": 
  Indicates that the data is a message
• "user": 
  The ID of the member who sent the message
• "text": 
  The actual text of the message
• "ts": 
  The timestamp that shows when the message was posted. You can use any online unix time converter to translate the timestamp.

Messages will be logged in the date file for the date on which the message was sent. Here’s what a very simple message would look like:

{
    "type": "message",
    "user": "U2147483697",
    "text": "Hello, world",
    "ts": "1355517523.000005"
}

Note: some messages may also include an "attachments" value. This value contains a list of objects attached to the message. 

Tip: you can translate the alphanumeric IDs for the "channel" and "user" fields by referencing the channels.json and users.json files.

Message subtypes

In addition to messages that members share in Slack, there are message subtypes – messages posted by apps, bots or integrations, or the messages that you see when a member joins a channel. Here's a full list of message subtypes:

Type	Description
bot_message	A message was posted by an app or integration
me_message	A message was sent with the /me slash command
message_changed	A message was changed
message_deleted	A message was deleted
channel_join	A member joined a channel
channel_leave	A member left a channel
channel_topic	A channel topic was updated
channel_purpose	A channel purpose was updated
channel_name	A channel was renamed
channel_archive	A channel was archived
channel_unarchive	A channel was unarchived
group_join	A member joined a group
group_leave	A member left a group
group_topic	A group topic was updated
group_purpose	A group purpose was updated
group_name	A group was renamed
group_archive	A group was archived
group_unarchive	A group was unarchived
file_share	A file was shared into a channel
file_reply	A reply was added to a file
file_mention	A file was mentioned in a channel
pinned_item	An item was pinned in a channel
unpinned_item	An item was unpinned from a channel

Saved items, pinned items and reactions

A message can have extra properties to show if anyone interacted with it.

• If you see "s_starred": true, a member has saved the message. If no one has saved the message, you won’t see this value.
• If a message has been pinned somewhere, you’ll see the IDs of the locations beside "pinned_to".
• If "reactions" is present, it will list all emoji reactions that have been added to the message ("name"), the number of members who reacted ("count") and a list of members who reacted ("users").

{
    "type": "message",
    "channel": "C2147483705",
    "user": "U2147483697",
    "text": "Hello, world",
    "ts": "1355517523.000005",
    "is_starred": true,
    "pinned_to": ["C024BE7LT", ...],
    "reactions": [
        {
            "name": "astonished",
            "count": 3,
            "users": [ "U1", "U2", "U3" ]
        },
        {
            "name": "facepalm",
            "count": 1034,
            "users": [ "U1", "U2", "U3", "U4", "U5" ]
        }

Note: The "reactions" value might not list all the members that reacted to a message, but the "count" value will always show the number of times that the reaction was used.

Messages will appear in the order that they were sent in the conversation. Messages include the following:

• the timestamp (in GMT) that shows when the message was sent.
• The Slack username of the person who sent the message.
• The contents of the message.

Here’s what a simple message might look like:

[2020-04-20 13:47:27]  Welcome to the Sales team channel! Our team is growing faster than ever

Your export file will not differentiate between messages in a thread and messages sent to a channel. All messages in a thread will appear in the flow of the conversation.

How to read an edited message

JSON files

TXT files

Members might edit messages that they’ve shared to a channel. If your export option allows for edit logs, an edited message will have an "edited" value with the following info:

• "user"
  The ID of the member who made the change.
• "ts"
  The timestamp that shows when the message was edited. You can use any online unix time converter to translate the timestamp.

These edits will be logged in the date file for the date on which the edit occurred. Here’s an example:

{
        "type": "message",
        "user": "UTXHL6F8A",
        "upload": false,
        "ts": "1590101612.000000",
        "text": "Hello, this is the message after it was edited.",
        "previous": {
            "text": "Hello, this is the original message.",
            "blocks": [
                {
                    "type": "rich_text",
                    "block_id": "Bts",
                    "elements": [
                        {
                            "type": "rich_text_section",
                            "elements": [
                                {
                                    "type": "text",
                                    "text": "Hello, this is the original message."
                                }
                            ]
                        }
                    ]
                }
            ]
        },
        "original_ts": "1590101603.000300",
        "subtype": "message_changed",
        "editor_id": "UTXHL6F8A",
        "blocks": [
            {
                "type": "rich_text",
                "block_id": "O+PJ",
                "elements": [
                    {
                        "type": "rich_text_section",
                        "elements": [
                            {
                                "type": "text",
                                "text": "Hello, this is the message after it was edited."
                            }
                        ]
                    }
                ]
            }
        ]
    }

Edited messages will appear at the end of a conversation’s TXT file under the Message edits header. Edited messages include the following:

• The timestamp (in GMT) that shows when the message was edited.
• The username of the person who updated the message.
• The timestamp that shows when the original message was sent.
• The contents of the original message, before any edits. The edited message will appear in the Messages section in the flow of the conversation.

Here’s an example:

[2020-04-20 13:47:27]  updated [2020-04-20 13:47:09]  Welcome to the Sales team channel!

How to read a deleted message

JSON files

TXT files

Members might delete messages that they've shared to a channel. If your retention policies allow for deletion logs, a deleted message will have a "previous" value and the following info:

• "text"
  The text of the deleted message.
• "ts"
  The timestamp that shows when the message was deleted. You can use any online unix time converter to translate the timestamp.

Message deletion will be logged in the date file for the date on which the message was deleted. Here’s an example:

{
        "type": "message",
        "user": "UTXHL6F8A",
        "upload": false,
        "ts": "1590101824.000000",
        "text": "",
        "previous": {
            "text": "This is a message that has been deleted.",
            "blocks": [
                {
                    "type": "rich_text",
                    "block_id": "ABSkQ",
                    "elements": [
                        {
                            "type": "rich_text_section",
                            "elements": [
                                {
                                    "type": "text",
                                    "text": "This is a message that has been deleted."
                                }
                            ]
                        }
                    ]
                }
            ]
        },
        "original_ts": "1590101818.000600",
        "subtype": "message_deleted",
        "editor_id": "UTXHL6F8A"
    }

Deleted messages will appear at the end of a conversation’s TXT file under the Message edits header. Deleted messages include the following:

• The timestamp (in GMT) that shows when the message was deleted.
• The username of the person who deleted the message.
• The timestamp that shows when the original message was sent.
• The contents of the original message.

Here’s what a deleted message might look like:

[2020-04-20 13:47:47]  deleted [2020-04-20 13:47:42]  Last week, we did X in sales!

How to read flagged content

On Enterprise Grid organisations with flagged content enabled, flagged messages as well as any comments left by reviewers will be included in an export of All channels and conversations.

JSON files

TXT files

Your export will contain a content_flags folder. Within the folder, there will be individual JSON files for every flagged message. The JSON files include the following information:

• "flagger_user_id"
  The ID of the user who flagged the message.
• "content_user_id"
  The ID of the user who wrote the flagged message.
• "date_created"
  The time stamp when the message was flagged.
• "comments"
  Any comments left by reviewers, including details like time stamps, who left the comment and whether the comment was deleted.
• "flagged_message"
  The details of the flagged message including message content, profile information of the message author and review status.

Here’s an example:

[
{
    "flag": {
        "id": "Fg016WC7RU9Z",
        "flagger_team_id": "E019B299WNQ",
        "flagger_user_id": "UTXHL6F8A",
        "content_user_id": "U014QD5SE67",
        "content_team_id": "T019B299WNQ",
        "date_created": 1727216082
    },
    "comments": [],
    "flagged_message": {
        "subtype": "moderated",
        "text": "This is the content of a message that was flagged for review",
        "user": "U014QD5SE67",
        "hidden": false,
        "type": "message",
        "ts": "1727216072.664659",
        "client_msg_id": "eba94731-3cf1-4005-90fa-49e0930fc9b3"
    }
}
]

Flagged content is not included in .TXT exports.

How to view files

JSON files

TXT files

Slack export files in JSON format do not contain any files from the workspace. They include a series of file links, found in your export file’s message history JSON files, that direct back to the workspace's files. To open the files, copy the file links from the JSON file and paste them into your browser.

Here’s how to find a particular file:

1. Open the folder for the conversation that the file was shared in.
2. Locate the JSON file that corresponds to the date on which the file was shared.
3. You’ll see the file link in the message details where it was shared, in the "files:" section.

Note: if you delete a file, or the channel or workspace that it was shared in, the file will no longer be accessible via the file link in your export.

The files folder of your ZIP file contains files sent by the single user selected in your export. File titles will appear in your channels and dms TXT files in the flow of a conversation, like this:

[2020-04-20 13:47:27] jjordan shared file(s) F01243S814M

Here’s how to find a particular file:

1. Open the TXT file for the conversation that the file was shared in.
2. Locate the file that you’d like to open in the message history and make note of the corresponding file title (e.g. F01243S814M).
3. Open the files folder and select the file title to open the file.

How to view canvases

JSON files

TXT files

Slack export files in JSON format will include a specific file that contains links to download all available canvases in HTML.

Canvases

Here's how to find a canvas:

1. Open canvases.json and search for the title of a canvas.
2. Locate the url_private_download in the details that correspond to your canvas.
3. Paste this URL in a browser to download the canvas and read its contents.

  {
    "id": "F05UA7XQXHS",
    "created": 1695846651,
    "name": "This_canvas_is_shared_in_General",
    "title": "This canvas is shared in General",
    "mimetype": "application/vnd.slack-docs",
    "filetype": "quip",
    "pretty_type": "Canvas",
    "user": "U018Y4QJK0E",
    "editable": true,
    "size": 48,
    "mode": "quip",
    "is_public": true,
    "is_tombstoned": false,
    "public_url_shared": false,
    "date_delete": 0,
    "url_private_download": "https://files.slack.com/files-pri/T019B299WNQ-F05UA7XQXHS/download/canvas?t=xoxe-1317077336772-EXAMPLE-TOKEN-INFO",
    "shares": [
      {
        "team": "T019B299WNQ",
        "channel": "C019UMH0P40"
      }

Channel canvases

Here's how to find a channel canvas:

1. Open the conversation folder that the channel canvas belongs to.
2. Locate the canvas_in_the_conversation.json, which will contain the url_private_download.
3. Paste this URL in a browser to download the canvas and read its contents.

{
    "id": "F05U12FNWT0",
    "created": 1695845524,
    "name": "GENERAL_CHANNEL_CANVAS",
    "title": "GENERAL CHANNEL CANVAS",
    "mimetype": "application\/vnd.slack-docs",
    "filetype": "quip",
    "pretty_type": "Canvas",
    "user": "USLACKBOT",
    "editable": true,
    "size": 17,
    "mode": "quip",
    "is_public": true,
    "is_tombstoned": false,
    "public_url_shared": false,
    "date_delete": 0,
    "url_private_download": "https:\/\/files.slack.com\/files-pri\/T019B299WNQ-F05U12FNWT0\/download\/canvas?t=xoxe-1317077336772-EXAMPLE-TOKEN-INFO",
    "shares": [
        {
            "team": "T019B299WNQ",
            "channel": "C019UMH0P40"
        }

Note: You can download canvas version history from the url_private_download URL if your workspace or organisation has data exports for all conversations enabled.

Comments on canvases

Comments on a canvas will be exported to their own folders in your export file. Here's how to associate the comments in an export file to their canvases:

1. Open file_conversations.json and search for the title of a canvas.
2. In the "name": field, take note of the FC ID or the canvas that you’d like to view comments for (ex. FC:F05UA7XQXHS).
3. Return to your export and locate the folder with a matching FC ID.
4. Open the FC folder to view comments made on the canvas. Comments will be sorted by the date that they were made

{
    "id": "C05UA7XQXHS",
    "name": "FC:F05UA7XQXHS:This canvas is shared in General",
    "created": 1695846691,
    "creator": "USLACKBOT",
    "is_archived": false,
    "members": [
        "U018Y4QJK0E"
    ],
    "topic": {
        "value": "",
        "creator": "",
        "last_set": 0
    },
    "purpose": {
        "value": "",
        "creator": "",
        "last_set": 0
    }

When the targeted user has interacted with a canvas or is a member of a channel where a canvas was shared, the TXT export will contain the following files and folders related to canvases:

• canvas_in_the_conversation.txt
  This file can be found within each conversation folder, and it contains a link to download that conversation’s canvas.
• Canvases 
  This folder contains unique subfolders for each canvas that the targeted user has access to. Within the folders, you can access to the canvas in HTML format.
• Files
  This folder contains unique subfolders for each canvas that contains an embedded file that the targeted user has access to.

Here's how to find a particular canvas:

1. Open the Canvases folder to view a list of all the canvases that the targeted user can access, organised into individual folders.
2. Open the folder that you’d like to view the canvas for, then open the HTML file for the canvas.

Note: You'll also need to reference the FC folders to locate file or web links that have been embedded in the canvas, when a message link is displayed as a card, or when a user is mentioned.