Exporting and seeing all your old Facebook statuses
If you would like to try out my application to export your old Facebook statuses, click here – once you’ve given the application the right permissions, a CSV file will be downloaded. It’s very much in beta, so please leave me feedback.
I am currently testing out a little Facebook application I’ve written to export and save all my old status updates (I’m surprised no-one else has done this?). I am only able to pull out ones since August last year – not all of them, even though they are stored in Facebook.
I recently saved all my old Facebook statuses in an incredibly painful way* – which made me realise how un-user-friendly it is to look back in time on Facebook. There’s no “browse by month” navigation like on many blogs. While there is a feed of your latest Facebook statuses, it only shows your last 10 statuses.
* I clicked on my profile page, then painfully kept clicking “Older posts” until I finally got back to when I joined Facebook in early 2007 and then saved this massive webpage to my computer (~10MB).
does it include archiving the comments in the statuses?
No, unfortunately we cannot find a way in the API to do this. Would be fantastic though!
I tried this (which is something I’ve been looking for for a while) and the csv it returned also only went back to August 2008 (26th) – 357 updates. It also didn’t seem to pick up all my updates (there seemed no pattern to this).
I’d second the comment about comments as well.
I tried today…
It is not working…
What happened for you max?
I have a mac and I downloaded an empty xls file
Can you try again? (I’m on a Mac too, so that won’t be the issue I don’t think.)
I tried again…
I see only:
Timestamp,Status
What browser are you using? Have you tried restarting? I’m not sure why that’s happening for you.
I was just saying today it would be cool if you could export all your statuses — and then display them in a calendar format… any way to do that?
I use Safari. I tried to restart… no news…
I tried again right now and… it works! Unexplainable….
And I can see my “last” 1497 status…. GREAT!
YAY!
Hi Sara,
I wrote mine into a diary manually (!) for fun.
You can do it with Twitter: http://www.recipester.org/Recipe:Add_your_Twitter_updates_into_Google_Calendar_27125999
… so it’d be possible to write some code to do that for these too I expect.
I’m trying it too and only seeing “Timestamp,Status” as well… any ideas? Should I restart Firefox or my entire computer?
Try restarting Firefox, I’m not sure why that happens sometimes for some people.
Perfect! thank you!
Awww. THANK YOU! This was exactly what I was needing!
It’s a shame that it doesn’t grab all of them, instead of just through August 08. But this is definitely better than the nothing FB provides!
Thanks!
Is there anyway to get statuses prior to Aug 2008?
I clicked on my profile page, then painfully kept clicking “Older posts” until I finally got back to when I joined Facebook in early 2007 and then saved this massive webpage to my computer (~10MB).
Honey, I love you. Exported everything from now back to my first update (Jan.5th, 2009 – when I first started using FB actively). Will recommend you to everyone.
It doesn’t seem to be giving me posts with links in them, alas. Though what it did give me was helpful…I’m on a Mac using Firefox BTW.
It’s just status updates – not posts/links that you share. I wish Facebook made it easier to grab out other things!
I’ve looked for something like this in the past, with no success. Thank you for creating this! Now for the comments
Heyyy! it worked. But you have to click “open” Instead of “save” and then just save it on your own. Thanks alot hunni <3 mwa
Also includes status updates I~ve deleted… ie typos. Is there a way to identify these so I can delete them??
[...] Facebook sucks in giving access to past updates and photos in a good way. I could find a way to download past statuses as a csv, but it has a very buggy format: http://www.socialarchivist.com/2009/08/20/exporting-all-your-old-facebook-statuses/ [...]
THANK YOU!!!!
Anyway to find out which status updates (or their dates) that are missing?
I previously used this on a PC and it worked pretty well, but I’ve just tried on a Mac (os x 10.6.2, chrome 5.0.307.11, excel 2008 12.2.3) and it is all broken up into columns strangely with odd characters/symbols etc.
David – I work on a Mac and have not experienced this issue. Can you email me the file? (rachel@cre8d-design.com)
Is there a way to export a specific friends status updates??
Not using this script, but it is possible to write a script to get a friend’s status updates. In the meantime, get your friend to download them for you?
I just completed this. Not bad! I now have all my updates from the last two-years. I’ve been on Facebook since 03, so that means I don’t have five years worth of updates. I’m wondering if they must have switched to a new database or something. How far do you think it will ever go back? I’d love to get back to 03/04.
I have tried a couple of times and just get two columns labeled timestamp and status with no data. I shut down and re-started my computer and received:
Fatal error: Uncaught exception ‘FacebookRestClientException’ with message ‘This API call could not be completed due to resource limits’ in /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/facebook-platform/php/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php:3094 Stack trace: #0 /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/test.php(19): FacebookRestClient->call_method(‘facebook.status…’, Array) #1 {main} thrown in /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/facebook-platform/php/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php on line 3094
I’m on a mac, running Firefox
Try again later, could have been an issue with Facebook’s API at the time.
for Facebook there are several apps that can do that for you…for 2009 I used “My year in status” and it made a nice 8×8 page for me but that app is down right now for some reason and i think only does 1 yr. Also there’s http://www.facebook.com/xsmystatus that will show all your past FB and Twitter updates and you can do new updates from there as well.
the whole reason i’m ON fb is to make it easier to record the funny things my little guy says/does. thank you so much!
hey,
thank u, it was really very easy to do but unfortunately, it doesn’t support right to left languages?
is there any I can access my friends comments on my old statuses?
Thanks for the script! seems to work, but mine also only went back to august of ’08. I actually had started to work on a similar script. was wondering if I could email you about a few coding details?
That’s fine Mike, please email me through the contact form.
Any chance that Facebook statuses could ever sync to Ical or Google Calendar? It would be awesome to be able to see what was going on in my life on a calendar
Just wondering.
Keep up the good work!
[...] Exporting All Your Old Facebook Statuses [...]
PROBLEM with Unicode:
It didn’t work for Unicode characters… sad
Hi there,
I really like the app. Been looking for something like this for ages. Everything looks fine for me in Excel.
But – the oldest update showing is from July 2008. And I joined Facebook long time before that. Hm.
And Unicode characters would be nice.
:)
Thanks for this! It’s a great app! I know you have said it’s only from August 2008 but do you know/working on getting older posts to this? I wanted from November 2007!
Hi everyone,
Again – Facebook doesn’t make the data prior to August 2008 available through their API currently. We’ve tried and tried to get data prior to this but they just don’t make it available.
I normally avoid FB apps like the plague but decided I had to try this one and it works great! Thanks!
I only got the timestamp & status column nothing in them though…..I use Firefox any suggestions?
Jackie – just try again if that happens; sorry that Facebook’s API is a bit buggy.
i just downloaded and got a spreadsheet with empty columns headed timestamp and staus???
Hooray – it worked!! I use Google Chrome for FB usually, it didn’t work there but worked right away when I used IE. I got my posts since October 2008. Still no way to go back further?
Oh wow! It worked!
There is a lot missing and I’ve had my facebook for quite some time so there is maybe a year missing on status’s. A lot of them are just not there as well. Kind of interesting to see how much my life has changed :-p
Good app. Hopefully you can fix the glitches.
I also just discovered the facebook supposedly deletes old facebook posts after awhile. That could be why.
Hi everyone,
I just released Archivedbook, a very simple website which allows to view a lot about your Facebook past: your old status updates, the messages your friends posted on your wall, and same on your friends’ profile too.
http://archivedbook.nckh.jp/
I hope you’ll like it.
Any feedback welcomed
Thx!
I too avoid FB applications like the plauge, but again, thank you soooo much, this worked for me too. It is exactly what I needed. I was using an iMac and Chrome, clicked ‘allow’ and two seconds later the excel spreadsheet back to Sept 2008 listed all my updates. Amazing and thanks for the simplicity.
[...] en dag kom jeg over et lite skript man kan kjøre for å hente ut gamle facebook-statuser. Sjekk ut Social Archivist, kjør skriptet og du får en .csv-fil (åpnes i Excel eller Numbers) med alle de statuser som [...]
Greg, I just tried your Archivedbook program. I love it! I love that you were even able to pull some of the comments people wrote & postings people wrote on my wall.
[...] Social Archivist Et script som henter ut tilgjengelige statusmeldinger på veggen din og legger dem i en hendig csv-fil. Liker veldig godt formatet på sluttproduktet, men mange meldinger manglet og den gikk ikke lenger tilbake enn 2008. [...]
Hi Rachel,
Thank you for this. What you are doing is great!
When I tried I got this after about a minute:
Request-URI Too Large
The requested URL’s length exceeds the capacity limit for this server.
Apache/2.0.54 Server at gridserver.com Port 80
Thanks a lot…it helps
greg ur waaay is ASOM!!!!!!!
OMG thank u so much
You did a great job on this! I think all my status updates are here… thank you so much!
Hey, this app is great. But I have a problem… it only exports statuses that I wrote in English. I also wrote statuses in Hebrew, but in the excel file they come out in unreadable characters.
Is there a way to export my Hebrew statuses? Please send mean answer via private message on Facebook, link added. Thanks!
Your app doesnt seem to be working for me. I tried it on a friends account and it worked but it doesnt with mine. It might help if I tell you that I update at least 3 times daily and my comments average on 50 or more per update since July 2009.
Help
Thank you so much! BTW, the first time I tried to use this, I received the timestamp message file I see a few commenters mentioned here. So I followed your link to the facebook page you made for this, then used the application from there. Now it works! So maybe it has something to do with how the application is accessed? Anyway, I, too, am keeping track of fast-growing kiddos and this was a God-send. Thank you soooooooooooooo much for making this available!!!
my excel sheet comes up empty!
perfect shot on MacOSX 10.6.3 with Safari 5
mine comes up empty too
Yeah I tried and haven’t been able to pull anything. when I tried a couple months ago it worked great, but now I only get timestamp entry and blank sheet… Sigh
Hi all -
As I said, Facebook’s API is a bit buggy. If it doesn’t work first time, try again later. Not much I can do about that unfortunately – ideally Facebook would have an export button themselves!
Thanks!
Rachel
Hi, I tried to run the export, but when I got the CSV it only had the headings (Timestamp and Status) I write A LOT of status updates. Could this be the issue?
I tried using Chrome, Safari and Firefox. All the same.
Cheers,
Mikey
Also, sometimes I get this error:
Fatal error: Uncaught exception ‘FacebookRestClientException’ with message ‘This API call could not be completed due to resource limits’ in /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/facebook-platform/php/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php:3094 Stack trace: #0 /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/test.php(19): FacebookRestClient->call_method(‘facebook.status…’, Array) #1 {main} thrown in /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/facebook-platform/php/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php on line 3094
Empty except for headers!! Help! This sounds so cool! (I’m using OS X if that helps…)
I am just getting an empty excel spreadsheet.
For all of you that have been having trouble, you should try the program Greg mentioned in a previous posting (about 2 1/2 months ago): http://archivedbook.nckh.jp/ It works great for me & you’re even able to pull some of the comments people wrote & postings people wrote on your wall. I run the application every once in a while & then I copy & paste it in a document to save the comments.
Rebecca: Thanks a lot. This is the tool I was looking for! as I post important academic links all the time in my Facebook. Archiving is important. Your archiver is fantastic!!
Not working for me… just a blank spreadsheet. Any ideas?
I’m having the same problem as Hannah–my spreadsheet is blank except for the timestamp and status headers. Any suggestions?
” ” just blank
I just checked and it worked for me, by clicking on the link up the very top.
[...] is a little buggy when it comes to this, but I’ve made a simple script to export your Facebook status updates to a CSV file. It’s buggy because sometimes it works, sometimes later on it doesn’t [...]
I just tried again but it’s still not working for me. I don’t have the full version of Word 2007 installed though…could this be part of the problem?
have a pc and only got an empty excel file.
As mentioned above, Facebook is buggy with returning this. If it doesn’t work first time, try again later.
It doesn’t work for Ubuntu Linix!
Try again later – it is not to do with the type of OS you’re on, it’s Facebook’s buggy API.
Tried this about a month ago on my computer at home. Tried again on my work computer…even restarted a few times. Still a blank sheet.
I tried this and it didn’t work. The file downloaded but it opened up excel and just said “Timestamp Status” but didn’t actually import. What am I doing wrong?
I’ve tried to do this about 10 times now, but every time it opens Excel all i can see is ‘Timestamp Status’
but i really want to be able to see all of my old statuses! please help x
Rachel,
I just tried again & it still works great for me.
I also just tried Greg’s program again (mentioned above, http://archivedbook.nckh.jp/) & it took a couple times of hitting retry, but that still works great too. Thanks to both of you for coming up with these.
I’m having the same problem as Sammy!
Please help!
[...] wasn’t easy for me to put together my lifestream – especially pulling out old Facebook status updates and while I love Twitter and Facebook, I’m getting enjoyment out of blogging more regularly [...]
its not working for me :S
Too bad it’s not working. There’s not a single script that does this…
Not working for me either — Any suggestions?
guess the author of this app doesn’t support it anymore…too bad. Would’ve been a great help…
Ollie: as I mentioned above it *does* still work… sometimes… thanks to Facebook’s buggy API. Not much I can do when the code is fine.
Tried it with 2 different computers (PC & Mac) with 4 different browsers (2 on each computer) with no luck…maybe the API just doesn’t want me to have my statuses…
Didn’t work for me. The file only had Timestamp, status.
no luck here either. Was trying to get the details from this time one year ago
[...] you have given the application the right permission, a CSV file will be downloaded. The saved file [via] will look like [...]
all i got on my spreadsheet was “timestamp” any help would be great
Is there any way to retrieve past status updates in FacebooK?…
First, I havent’ tried any of these, but there do seem to be options.
There is a Facebook app: http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=114370412642
Also, again, I have not tested this tool, but I’ve seen a few people mention it on Twitter a…
I’m on a Mac running Firefox. It didn’t work for me. I got a blank file.
This still works for me fine, I’m using Internet Explorer 8 on Windows XP.
Seems that older statuses are gradually disappearing though…when I first tried this in March 2010, it went back to August 2008. As of now (November 2010) it only goes back to June 2009. Still an excellent tool though!
I tried this and all I got was the following: (I kept restarting Firefox)
Fatal error: Uncaught exception ‘FacebookRestClientException’ with message ‘Session key invalid or no longer valid’ in /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/facebook-platform/php/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php:3094 Stack trace: #0 /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/test.php(19): FacebookRestClient->call_method(‘facebook.status…’, Array) #1 {main} thrown in /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/facebook-platform/php/facebookapi_php5_restlib.php on line 3094
Would you like to try my first Facebook application, “I Told You, the Facebook statuses extractor”, with this app you can read in one page all your and friends status updates, with comments for each status. Also you can read friends statuses pubblished before your friendship, With “I Told You”, you can save all statuses as pdf, doc or txt file. Chek out http://www.facebook.com/app.itoldyou
Hi Dario,
Your app looked fun but it looks like it’s not working for me or my friends. Even after waiting for 10 minutes, it was still stucked in perpetual loading, my friend list was unsorted and couldn’t even being entirely loaded.
Hello Greg, can you help me to know why is not working for you? Every day a lot of people use this app with no problem. Sure, there is some issue… This app was tested with multiple client configuration, works with IE6 also!
I like your app, very cool… Regards
Unfortunately this app work for hardly anyone. Allllllllllllllllllllllllllllllli get notifications for the comments here, and all of them where made because the app just doesn’t work.
Thanks Dario.
I am using Safari 5 for Mac. Unfortunately I cannot tell you why it doesn’t work, but only how… In the frienst list, I can scroll down at will but the list goes empty after something like 40 friends.
Try this app I made, you can use it to extract all your old links and copy just the html code. I believe there is a limit on the FQL queries, or it could be that they were all archived in 2008 as you mentioned. I can’t tell though, I didn’t join until 2009. http://apps.facebook.com/linkman/
@Greg Thank you for feedback, i will try with Safari 5…
About friends list, it’s true, on the left you can find only 40 random friends, to look for all friends try the autosuggest input at the top.
hi..i tried in opera, mozilla n IE 8..it dint work…
I’ve tried multiple times. The very first time, when I clicked on the blue “click here” at the top of this page, I got the FB App allow page (to which I said yes). Like Max, I only get a blank document w/timestamp/status on it. I’m using Ubantu/Linux and Open Office (which is like Excel). Help?! I think this would be fantastic if it works!
I wanted to let you all know that Facebook has finally created an option where you can download all this information that we’ve all been trying to recover. You go to Account>>Account Settings>>Download Your Information. It stalled a couple times when I tried to do it, but then it worked for me & it shows your statues along with the responses.
hey thanks Rebecca!
Didnt work , just gave me a Blank Excel sheet
Just so everyone knows, I believe Facebook is allowing you to download a file of EVERYTHING from pictures, videos, to wall posts. I have yet to receive the download file, so I cannot say for sure, but to anyone else who would like to test it:
https://register.facebook.com/download/?h=f077e1a894c1afa2f76e8c559b83fa00
Fatal error: Cannot use string offset as an array in /nfs/c03/h05/mnt/51433/domains/cre8d-design.com/html/facebook/test.php on line 21
I’m confused about how to give the app the “right permissions”? It doesn’t seem to be workin’ for me!
I just get ‘timestamp’ and ‘status’ but the rest is empty…
doesn’t work for me at all with firefox, chrome or IE
https://register.facebook.com/download/?h=e2e9298a6df7abd4a6bd4f28a25715b7
this isn’t working for me i’m using google chrome do i need to use firefox?
Hi all — just tested this again and the app does work but Facebook’s API is buggy (see all the other backup/download scripts out there). My recommendation now is to use Facebook’s backup button they offer: http://www.socialarchivist.com/2010/12/22/how-to-export-and-back-up-your-facebook-content/. Am closing off comments now.