How to tell whether a message will be sent by iMessage or not

[mrochester]

Hi all

Now it's my understanding that when a message is to be sent via the iMessage service, the send button is blue, and when it's to be sent via the normal SMS service, it is green. However, even if I start to send an iMessage to someone, after I press send, it then sometimes changes to a green SMS message. On Christmas day I sent someone a picture message over iMessage. But it didn't send, so the phone changed it to an SMS message, and I have been charged the going rate for sending an MMS message by my network. I want to know before I send an iMessage that it really is going to be sent via the iMessage network, and not change after I press send. But I also don't want to turn off the send as SMS if iMessage fails option. Is there anyway of doing this? I was always under the impression that the phone would automatically pick which service the recipient could receive, yet it doesn't seem to do this on quite a number of occasions. Why was it showing me that the recipient could receive an iMessage even though they couldn't at that time?

Thanks for any help.

M.

 

[waw74]

settings -> messages -> send as SMS
set that to off.

if iMessage fails, it will ask you if you want to send as SMS, or you can try iMessage again.


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imessage only tries to send for a few minutes, if the recipient is not available, then it sends as SMS, which means it sits on the wireless carrier's servers until they get back in range, instead of apple's.

i live in new york city, and occasionally have messages fail, and they will send via SMS if my friends are on the subway. (at least they did till i turned that setting off, now i just have to manually resend the text)

 

[maladroit]

I, too, echo what WAW said, especially if I'm texting someone on the subway.


One quirk I have found is that sometimes messages don't send as SMS messages or iMessages. Instead, the bubble is blue, but does not say "delivered" underneath the text. I'll either have to copy and paste and resend or it "send as a text message." Just a quirk, I suppose.