Chat history

(Note: chat history for Google Talk is only available to users who are signed in with a Gmail username.)

Chat history allows you to store the text of your Gmail and Google Talk chats in your Gmail account so you can easily search for them later. You can even respond to these chats like you would to regular Gmail messages.

To access your chat history, click the Chats label in your Gmail account. A list of chats will appear, similar to the way conversations are listed in your inbox. You can forward, label, star, and trash chats just like Gmail messages.

When you search in Gmail, matching chat conversations will show up along with matching email conversations. All chats are labeled Chats and are marked with the chat icon () so you can easily distinguish them from emails.

To take better advantage of Gmail's chat functionality, learn how to change your chat history settings, how to go 'off the record' or browse our full list of chat topics.