Guide
My Snapchat export came as multiple zip files — what do I do?
If your Snapchat Memories export arrived as several mydata~*.zip files instead of one, nothing went wrong. Large libraries are simply delivered in parts. The important thing is to keep every part and fix them together — and MemoriesExport is built to handle multi-part exports.
Why a big export arrives in multiple parts
Snapchat splits large Memories exports into numbered parts so no single download is unwieldy. You'll see files like mydata~<id>.zip (part 1), mydata~<id>-2.zip, mydata~<id>-3.zip, and so on — parts 1 through k. They aren't separate exports and they aren't duplicates. Together they make up one library; your photos, videos, and the HTML index pages are spread across all of them.
Where the metadata hides — and why one part is special
Here's the catch that trips people up: only one of the parts contains memories_history.json, the manifest that holds the real capture date and GPS location for every memory. It might not be the first part — it lives in whichever part Snapchat happened to put it in. The media files themselves carry no dates or locations of their own, so that single JSON is the only place your timeline and map data exist for the entire export.
Why you must keep every single part
Keep all of them, with their original names. Dropping a part has two very different failure modes, and both are bad. Lose a media part and those particular photos and videos are just gone from the result — there's nothing to fix because the files aren't there. Lose the part holding memories_history.json and the situation is worse: with no manifest, nothing in the whole library can be dated or geotagged, because that file is the only source of those values. So before you do anything else, confirm every numbered part finished downloading.
How to fix a multi-part export the right way
Don't extract the parts and merge them into one folder. Because each part reuses the same internal folder paths, combining them can quietly overwrite files. Instead, leave every mydata~*.zip zipped and named as Snapchat delivered it, and give the complete set to MemoriesExport. It reads all the parts together, finds the manifest wherever it lives, matches each entry to its media across the parts, and writes the correct date into each photo's EXIF and the location into the QuickTime atoms Apple Photos needs to show your videos on the map. See how it works for the full pipeline.
One honest caveat: Snapchat groups same-day memories without a per-item timestamp, so the exact minute-by-minute order within a single day can't always be perfectly reconstructed. The date and location for each memory come back reliably — that's what fills your gallery's timeline and map correctly across the whole multi-part library.
Frequently asked questions
- Why did my Snapchat export download as several zip files?
- Snapchat splits large Memories exports into multiple parts so each download stays a manageable size. A big library can arrive as mydata~….zip, then -2, -3 and so on. It's one export delivered in pieces, not several separate exports.
- Do I need to keep all the zip parts?
- Yes — keep every single part. Each part holds a different slice of your media, and only one of them contains memories_history.json, the file with all your real dates and locations. Lose any part and you lose those photos or videos, or the metadata for the whole library.
- Do I have to unzip and merge the parts myself first?
- No, and you shouldn't merge them into one folder. The parts reuse identical internal paths, so combining them can overwrite files. Keep each zip as-is and hand the whole set to MemoriesExport, which reads them together.
- Should I rename the zip files?
- No. Leave the original mydata~….zip names intact. The part number is meaningful — it helps keep your memories in the right order across the boundaries between parts, so renaming can scramble that.