Why Is SMS Texting Still Popular?

With a plethora of messaging apps available, why is old-school SMS texting still so widespread?

[Z]

“Older generations prefer SMS” lol we all know that’s not true. They always call and it always makes me panic

[grannynorma]

TL;DW:
1. phone numbers have texting
2. americans & canadians

[AndrewFomin]

I live in Russia and, literally, none of my non-American friends ever use SMS for anything. Bank and other codes aren't included of course. Everybody has either WhatsApp or Telegram (or most likely both).

[AshesOfEther]

I like how he mentioned unlimited texting like a new thing, but where I live I'd be surprised to see a plan that didn't include it.

[maaxmith]

SMS is really more of an US thing. I live in germany and SMS is literally dead, I know exactly one person who I get messages from via SMS instead of WhatsApp, and thats cause she uses iMessage and I have an Android.

[SIeipner]

1. It's free
2. Everyone can send and receive them regardless of the phone they have or apps they have installed.
3. Most of the time you only need to send text.

[reclaimerfishing]

1. I don’t want to take to anyone
2. I can answer when I want
3. I don’t want to talk to anyone

[NoName-rhxu]

I'm 43 and disabled it's all I can afford. I lost a couple of finger to diabetis and it just to hard to use facebook now anyway. When I started using facebook 20+ years ago it was so simple. I wish things stayed the same as they were then.

[GensoLight]

No, it isn't. I am from China and the only use of SMS to me is to receive one-time-password when I am logging in to something.

[virtual_edition]

Because "feature rich" isn't inherently a good thing. If the features have nothing to do with what you are trying to accomplish its just bloat.

[LucasP.]

You strange people using sms, whatsapp or that strange things of nowadays. Legends like me still use smoke signals

[Qalibrated]

I use SMS pretty often, as it's easy, included in my subscription, most people i know can send/receive them, doesn't require an internet connection and pretty much all phones got a built in app for it when you turn it on for the first time. It's just convenient

[MsWouto]

Well SMS is also still a thing in countries that charge ridiculous amounts for data

[devlmn]

Pretty sure this is US only thing, the last time I used SMS was more than 10 years ago

[tsartomato]

"data connection" aka that thing which covers about 80% of the city and absent anywhere else while costs a ton of money

[dftfire]

(1) It's always built-in, no app download required
(2) Only requires a phone-number, no other account or login
(3) Simple
(4) On virtually all UK contracts you get unlimited texts: long gone are the days of 10p an SMS
(5) Some people still use feature-phones or dumb-phones so WhatsApp is not an option when messing them

MMS ("Picture Messaging") is dead though. Can't say I know anyone who still uses it, and on most contacts you still pay per MMS, they're not included

[lil----lil]

Answer: No Social Networking needed! 🤣

[alexander-jlcs]

If you could make the MMS message work, you'll be a GOD

[morcputer]

In Europe (especially Germany) there is like an quiet agreement that everybody uses what's app instead of sms

[juantelle]

Speak for the US and Canada. The rest of the world uses WhatsApp. It’s very weird using sms outside the states.