Is there any way to export or save text messages within Mac Skype? I don’t want to just take dozens of screen captures if possible!
Skype has always been in its own world, slogging through the mire while other video chat and conferencing systems like Google Hangouts, Zoom and Apple FaceTime have risen to compete. In the business world, however, Skype still is the go-to for a quick conversation with a colleague across the globe – or around the corner. It’s really designed as a video + audio conference system, supporting two or more people connected simultaneously, but turns out that Skype also has a perfectly functional text messaging feature too, one quite similar to text messaging through a smartphone using SMS.
Unfortunately, no, there’s no way to save your dialog or export it as a PDF, rich text file or similar.
However, there’s a pretty nifty way you can select messages and then copy and paste that dialog into another app. Let me show you what I mean…
First off, here’s a chat I had with a colleague who was testing out Skype on his computer. I’m using the Mac Skype app, I believe he’s on Windows (tho it doesn’t really matter for this particular task):
It’s not just text messaging, you can see that it’s a transcript of all interaction: Notice at 12:35 it records a 2 minute, 16 second call between us too. The question, of course, is how do I save this back and forth text conversation?
To do that, move your cursor to the immediate right of any message. A hidden “•••” link appears and a click reveals a menu of options:
As highlighted, you’ll want to choose “Select Messages” here in the Skype app. Then, just like in iMessage [oops, “Messages”] on your Mac system or iPhone, you’ll see a small circle adjacent to each and every text message in the conversation:
You can see here that I’ve selected each text message on screen. You can scroll upwards and select as many as you desire. There is not, as far as I can tell, however, a “select all” sort of feature, so if you have dozens of comments, it’s going to inevitably be a bit tedious.
All selected? Now, look at the very bottom because three new options have appeared: Copy, Forward and Remove. Yes, you can forward a dialog to someone else on Skype. But for this task, choose “Copy“. If it’s working properly, you’ll see this flash on screen for a few seconds:
Now, open up the app you want to have receive these messages. MS Word, Pages, Stickies, an email message, lots of choices. I’ll just use a favorite app of mine, Notes, and open up a new, blank note.
A simple Edit > Paste and here’s what I see:
Mission accomplished. And you can do this too. Not as easy as it could be, but… functional!
Pro Tip: I’ve been writing about the Mac since MacOS 9 was the rage. Please check out my extensive Mac help area for lots more tutorials while you’re here! Thanks.