iPhone backup does not include text messages.

prime26 wrote:

I have yet to go to iCloud.com to see if messages are there. as they were not before.

This is the incorrect process!

The messages would be retained in your iPhone’s backup, which happens to be housed in iCloud. The messages are not accessible at iCloud.com. They are only accessible by restoring the backup.

prime26 wrote:

I am trying to back up my messages to the cloud so I can retrieve them when necessary.

What you are trying to do is not possible. You can’t store messages in iCloud so that you can retrieve them when you want them. You either backup messages with iCloud and can restore them when you restore a backup, or you sync messages with iCloud in which case they are not included in the backup.

If you sync messages with iCloud and you delete them on the phone, you also delete them in iCloud and they cannot be recovered.

There are several ways to use iCloud. If you go to Settings/[your name]/iCloud and turn on messages they will sync to iCloud. you can’t view them there, but if you have any other Apple devices logged into iCloud they will be visible on those devices.

If you do not turn on Messages as above and you then back up to iCloud or to your computer the messages will be in the backup. However, you can’t view them in the backup; all you can do is restore the backup to your phone, which will overwrite everything on it.

If you don’t turn on Messages in iCloud settings there is an indirect way to see them in a computer backup (but not an iCloud backup) by getting a 3rd party iPhone backup extractor program for your computer. This will let you view them and print them out, but not use them or reply to them. There is one backup extractor program that can recover them from an iCloud backup, however. You can get this app from icloudbackupextractor.com. It is NOT free, however, and I personally don’t think the price is even reasonable.

Might you have a question?

Indeed if you house your messages in iCloud, they are not backed up.

You would have to restore the backup to do that. I do not advise doing this for a mere checkout. Do it only if you need the restore.