> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.convai.com/api-docs/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.convai.com/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/sessions-and-transcripts.md).

# Sessions and transcripts

Understand why every opening of a chat experience is a new room, what carries over from the last one, and what is kept afterwards.

A session is one conversation in a chat experience, from the characters taking their seats to the moment the conversation ends. Every opening starts a new session, and a finished one is kept as a transcript you can read but not continue.

### Why every opening is a new room

Opening a chat experience always starts a new room. There is no control that reopens a past conversation, and a conversation that has ended cannot be re-entered.

The room opens empty. It becomes a session once the characters you seat have joined, and the experience records it from there. Opening an experience and going back without adding anyone records nothing. A session nobody wrote in is still recorded and still listed, with **No messages recorded** in place of its first question.

Opening the experience is not the only thing that starts a session. **Clear conversation** ends the conversation you are in and keeps you in the same room, emptied, so seating characters there again starts another numbered session at the same address. See [Room controls reference](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/running-the-room/room-controls-reference.md).

Sessions are numbered in the order they ran. `Session 1` is the first the experience recorded, and the newest one leads every list. A new session never renumbers the ones before it.

### What carries over to the next session

The brief carries over. The characters and the messages do not. The experience's own page says so beside **Previous sessions**: "Each session is its own thread. The brief carries over; the characters and the messages do not." Here is what a new room starts with, and what it starts without:

| What                                                                                                                                                 | Carries into the next session                                                               |
| ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| The room type, the purpose, and the [briefing every character receives on joining](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/the-room-brief.md) | Yes. They are fixed when the experience is created, so every session runs on the same words |
| The experience name                                                                                                                                  | Yes, until you rename it                                                                    |
| The [room ID](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/running-the-room/room-controls-reference.md#the-room-id)                                | Yes. It belongs to the experience, so it is the same in every session                       |
| The [characters you seated](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/add-characters-to-the-room.md)                                            | No. A new room opens with nobody in it, and you choose again                                |
| The conversation                                                                                                                                     | No. Messages belong to the session they were sent in                                        |
| The [respond mode](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/running-the-room/respond-modes-reference.md) you set                               | No. A new room starts on **Auto · room brief decides**, whatever the last session ended on  |

Seating four characters, running a long conversation, and coming back the next day gives you an empty room and the same brief.

### What a finished session keeps

A finished session is kept as a read-only thread: your messages, the replies each one drew, and a note naming any character that stayed quiet. Each recorded session also carries when it ran, the first question you asked, and how many messages it holds, which are the details the experience's page shows on every row.

A message that carried files keeps their names. The files themselves are not kept, so a past session names what was shared without holding it. See [Share files with the room](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/share-files-with-the-room.md).

Reading a session again does not reopen it. Another message needs another session, with the characters seated again.

A transcript is not a copy of the live room. Some of what the room shows while a conversation is running is not part of the record, and [Review a past session](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/sessions-and-transcripts/review-a-past-session.md) sets out what is left off.

### Who can open a past session

A chat experience, the rooms opened from it, and their transcripts belong to the account that created them and open only for that account. No other account reaches them.

What a session recorded can be downloaded as a Markdown file. See [Export a transcript](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/sessions-and-transcripts/export-a-transcript.md).

### Where each task lives

<table data-view="cards"><thead><tr><th></th><th data-hidden data-card-target data-type="content-ref"></th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td><strong>Review a past session</strong><br>Open an experience's history, pick a finished conversation, and read what the transcript records.</td><td><a href="/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/sessions-and-transcripts/review-a-past-session.md">Review a past session</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Export a transcript</strong><br>Download a conversation as a Markdown file, and know what that file holds.</td><td><a href="/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/sessions-and-transcripts/export-a-transcript.md">Export a transcript</a></td></tr></tbody></table>

A conversation that is still running belongs to the room's own pages rather than these.

{% content-ref url="/pages/kSda6H5yqLJkFsnndHYK" %}
[Running the room](/api-docs/no-code-experiences/chat-experiences/running-the-room.md)
{% endcontent-ref %}


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