Oppo, Xiaomi, and Vivo phones can now pull Android app data to a new smartphone

Ben Schoon | Mar 22 2023 - 7:06 am PT

Switching smartphones can be a hassle for a lot of reasons, but it’s even worse when you’re switching between brands. In China, some of the biggest smartphone brands in Oppo, Xiaomi, and Vivo are teaming up to make this process easier.

Announced on Weibo, these three brands are building support for migrating data between devices even if moving from another brand’s device. Xiaomi’s MIUI, Oppo’s ColorOS, and Vivo’s OriginOS will all now support migrating data from the device, including from third-party apps, to your new smartphone.

The ability to more easily pull basic data, like text logs, photo libraries, app lists, and various settings without downloading specific apps would already be a big help in speeding up this process, but what’s particularly interesting here is support for migrating data from third-party Android apps.

Xiaomi briefly explains (translated):

Xiaomi has newly added support for migrating third-party application data from vivo and OPPO phones, so you don’t have to worry about your chat records when switching phones!

The migration process of switching between Android phones tends to vary from brand to brand, but generally speaking you’ll pull from either your existing device or a cloud backup, with the migration process pulling over photos/videos, call/text logs, settings (such as Wi-Fi passwords), accounts, and your list of apps. But as it stands today, Google’s official tools as well as others (such as Samsung Smart Switch) can only install those apps. Very few Android apps support also pulling over their data/login credentials.

Xiaomi, Vivo, and Oppo haven’t been specific on how this new process works, but it seems to only be available in China for the time being. However it works, it’s an initiative we hope to see more widespread in the future.