Force iMessage to send an SMS?

megan1410 wrote:

It happened to me just after I switch to IOS 7 as prior to that it automatically changes to SMS text if recipient has no wifi available.

This is incorrect.

You can send iMessages if you (the sender) has wifi or cellular data. It will cahnge to SMS if your device cannot connect to iMessage server.

Doesn't matter what the receiver has. If they do not have iMessage set to On, you cannot send them an iMessage whether they are on wifi or cellular.

I noticed my mom is no longer getting my texts as their wifi at home is busted.

Does she have iMessage set to On (in Settings > Messages)?

Does she have a cellular data plan?

She would need both of these to get iMessages if she does not have wifi.

So I checked my settings and I turned on "Send as SMS" option as it says enabling it will send text as SMS when iMessage is unavailable. tested it and it worked.

Send as SMS when iMessage is unavailable means the iMessage server is down/you cannot connect to it or the recipient does not have iMessage set to On.

I noticed my mom is no longer getting my texts as their wifi at home is busted.

Does she have iMessage set to On (in Settings > Messages)? YES

Does she have a cellular data plan? No that is why she needed wifi to get on iMessage

She would need both of these to get iMessages if she does not have wifi. She is able to receive texts even without wifi so the problem is the imessage I was sending was not converting automatically to SMS as it did in the past

So I checked my settings and I turned on "Send as SMS" option as it says enabling it will send text as SMS when iMessage is unavailable. tested it and it worked.

Send as SMS when iMessage is unavailable means the iMessage server is down/you cannot connect to it or the recipient does not have iMessage set to On. Not sure about that but when I turned it on, my messages to her now converts automatically to SMS while her wifi is out. At the same time I get to continue to send iMessages to everybody else wih iMessage. So my problem is solved.

Thank you Megan! I have been stuck in the same situation was your mom for the past few months. I got my friends to enable Send as SMS and now I receive their imessages as sms when I have no access to wifi.

megan1410 wrote:

It happened to me just after I switch to IOS 7 as prior to that it automatically changes to SMS text if recipient has no wifi available. I noticed my mom is no longer getting my texts as their wifi at home is busted. So I checked my settings and I turned on "Send as SMS" option as it says enabling it will send text as SMS when iMessage is unavailable. tested it and it worked.

My is already turned on... and problem still there 😟

Hi everyone.

I suffer from the same problem here.

Let's hope for next update...

This happened to me when I switched from an iPhone to an Android device. My wife still has an iPhone, so our prior series of text messages were all via iMessage. Once I switched to my new android phone, her text messages to me went out via iMessage and did not detect that there was no iPhone on the other end to receive. Unfortunately, I only discovered this after a few days of missed text messages and my wife finally calling me out on ignoring her. Thanks Apple!

The fix was similar to what others posted - from the wife's phone, I just finger held one of the blue bubbles and it prompted me send as text. Did that, then replied from my phone. Once we established a back and forth via SMS, her iPhone sent subsequent messages via SMS.

Just another reason why I'm migrating away from Apple. They used to justify the rediculous premiums at Microsoft's expense because everything "just worked". Now it occurs to me that I probably have to go through this with every person I know that has texted me from an iPhone. Awesome.

"I am talking when your recipient goes out of range, not you."

I found a solution to force iphone to send a SMS (and not an iMessage).

When you have no-data connection, the other iphones still think you are connected to imessage. Consequently, you need to be connected to internet (or turn on 3G) to received your messages.

To solve this problem, you have to desactivate completly imessage from your mum's phone. But, before doing that, you need to unlink your mum's phone from imessage: go to "Settings > Phone > My Number" and delete it (write "0" instead of your phone number). Then go to imessage and untick all your email adresses. Now, turn off imessage.

If you don't turn on imessage on your mum's phone, this should work.

It's particularly painful, if the recipient has multiple devices. My mom travelled from Scotland to Poland, taking her iPhone with her, but leaving the iPad behind. It was virtually impossible to send her text messages.

Same happens today with a friend of mine who flew over from USA to Germany - devices left at home insist on receiving iMessage, while the iPhone he has with him has no internet (roaming and such).

My solution is - go airplane mode just before sending the message. It fails and gives you an option to resend as SMS instantly.

Here is a specific use case. My daughter has a limited Data Plan. She turns off data regularly to preserve her data plan. I want to send a text message to her from my iPhone to hers. I can't because when you turn off iMessage prior to 8.1 it would then send as SMS. You could have green and blue conversations with the same person. Since upgrading to 8.1 this is no longer possible. Why would Apple remove this capability? Really dumb. It is very frustrating as a recent convert from Android. You have to turn off cell data and wait for it to fail and then double tap to get send as SMS. This doesn't let you send MMS messages though!

iMessages (unless you're sending photos & videos) use very, very little of your cellular data plan, and if you're connected to wi-fi it doesn't use up any of your cellular data plan. It's really pointless to turn off the cellular data just to try to force it to send as SMS.

Either turn iMessage on or leave it off.

iMessages will only work with data turned on both sender and recipient. And if you are lucky it will work with recognized WIFI. If data is turned off either the sender or recipient Messages will not send or receive the iMessage. Which means that unless the sender knows to have "Send as SMS" turned on and the message goes out green instead of blue the recipient will not receive the iMessage unless their data is turned on. This is a big problem since no one is ever informed about the need of “Send as SMS” to be set in on in order to send or receive text messages when the apple system is "not available". Why would anyone turn off their data? To avoid overages. Not everyone can afford or has an unlimited data plan available to them the data setting to their iPhone will be turned off most days until they need to turn it on for something specific where they know data is needed.

Using iMessages with their current default settings from Apple can result in huge delays in sending or receiving iMessages. The blue color for Apple iMessages is fairly accurate since you will be blue when your iMessages never leave your iPhone or are not received by the person you send them to for hours, days or even weeks. Apple needs to change how iMessages work so that iMessage users do not have to jump through hoops to get our messages sent and or received.

The amount of data iMessages uses is not the only issue. The issue is how or what else is running in the background of your iPhone that you are not aware of that becomes the issue. The other issue is whether or not your data will switch over to WIFI and remain on WIFI when your data is turned on. I myself never have my data on ever since the day I was in my home with my WIFI working properly my data plan was used up within less than 24 hours. You cannot always count on you iPhone to stay connected to WIFI if your data is turned on at the same time. And it can be a very expensive lesson to learn.

Thanks for the tip. Did not that forwarding as a new messages would make it "Send as SMS"

Underdone is correct, I can establish an iMessage connection but when the recipient goes off data my iPhone automatically sends an SMS, even in mid thread. (iPhone5/IOS8)

Bebo Gordo wrote:

iMessages will only work with data turned on both sender and recipient. And if you are lucky it will work with recognized WIFI. If data is turned off either the sender or recipient Messages will not send or receive the iMessage. Which means that unless the sender knows to have "Send as SMS" turned on and the message goes out green instead of blue the recipient will not receive the iMessage unless their data is turned on

If the message goes out green, then there is no iMessage. It is SMS