Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Do you fear being "green bubbled" if you switch from an iPhone?

  • Yes, I fear being "green bubbled"

    Votes: 80 42.3%
  • No, I do not fear being "green bubbled"

    Votes: 109 57.7%

  • Total voters
    189
The question is: why should iphone users use whatsapp when apple got imessage? Imo, i think people are more in tuned with imessage since that is what lot of users are introduced with.

Answer: the same reason why Bill Gates opens a WeChat account. You do what it takes to reach out to people important to you.
 
  • Like
Reactions: eVolcre
I still don’t get what the big deal is. If I switched to Android right now, all of the people whom I contact through iMessage I would contact the same way through regular SMS texts. These days I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have unlimited nation wide texting. And if I or they are out of the country, I would use some other IM service like WhatsApp or FB messenger, like I currently use with about half of my regular contacts anyway.

A messaging platform is only as good as the number of people you know who use it, and as I’ve said, about half the people I know are Android users, so the messengers that are most important to me are Facebook and regular texting.
 
WhatsApp and the others all compress. If you can find one that doesn’t compress videos/photos please let me know. I’ve tried tons of them, including the popular ones.

Whatsapp does compress but there is no significant quality loss. I share video (and vice versa) often through whatsapp and the videos the look as I sent them.
 
  • Like
Reactions: macfacts
Answer: the same reason why Bill Gates opens a WeChat account. You do what it takes to reach out to people important to you.
Follow-up: why couldn't whatsapp or any similar apps creat an extension or something to make it easier to reach to others?
 
Too funny. When I see the Green Bubble internally I say, UGH. I feel like I'm having a conversation with no clothes on. Maybe I should see a therapist? ;)

We have 1 friend with an Android phone and whenever we include him in group texts everyone complains how we've been green bubbled. lol. No one actually cares but it's funny. It's all blue until someone adds him in and then GREEN BUBBLES OF DEATH.
 
Nope, I switch back and forth between iOS and Android frequently. In fact, before Apple fixed some of the iMessage deregistration issues (like missing group texts) a few years back, I would disable it and stay a green bubble even while using an iphone. But perhaps this whole thing is a generation or two below me...
 
I'm not saying not to use iMessage. It's great if everyone you know has an iPhone. But you made a comment about sending pictures and videos through SMS. I was merely pointing out that there are apps like whatsapp that people use daily to share high quality videos and photos without compression.

In fact outside the US no one uses iMessages. Whatsapp, telegram and in line are the most popular messaging platforms.
[doublepost=1507562495][/doublepost]

Same here. I live in Qatar and there is a mix of Android and iOS so eveyone pretty much uses whatsapp. When I was in England and Malaysia it was the same thing.

However back in the states most of my friends do have iphones so they communicate via iMessage.

This is so true. In my experience outside the US, iMessage is nothing. In Japan everyone I met with used Line, use it for phone calls, texting, everything. I always use Line when I’m in Japan.
 
  • Like
Reactions: eVolcre
I did not know this was a thing until reading someone say it here recently. And I was certain they were messing around but upon further review it appears they were serious. Does anyone really fear switching from an iPhone because you don't want to lose your blue bubble? I'm not talking about losing the benefits of iOS, I'm simply talking about the physical color of the message bubble.

Is it some sort of social stigma in the iOS community to be "green bubbled?" lol

If Android every comes out with a true integrated alternative to iMessage (maybe even a cross-platform solution?) I will abandon iPhone
 
Not get green bubbled, but get left out.

Android is still a pain in the arse.

Last week we all took a trip to my camp site up in Maine. We have a massive group chat with about 14 people in it. We went water rafting, paintballing, 4 wheeling, ate lots of greasy unhealthy foods, laid out in my deck watching the stars . Man We had a good ol’ time.

13 came except one. Guess what phone he was using ? Yup. A brand new “ FlagShip “ Galaxy S8.

He got none of the messages and had no idea we where even planning it out.

We did some research ( because he was not only offended and very concerned )

Since he went from a 7+ to an android device ( turned off his iMessage’s and everything ) he stopped receiving messages on group chats he was in while on the Apple boat.

So becuae of this, he received none of them going forward. What had to happen was.

All of us DELETE a group chat that is a little over 2 years old full of laughs, links, hysterical roasts of each other, screen shots, pictures of foods, recipe’s etc all because 1 person decided to upgrade to an android device. This is unethical and wrong.

So, he is now very much so enjoying his brand new iPhone 8 Plus after giving back his Galaxy S8 Plus that for some reason had a broken screen and damaged corners lol

No one is afraid of a green bubble. But afraid of getting left out or worse, someone think you’re ignorming them.

iMessage is brilliant and comes installed right out of the box.

No need for useless 3rd party apps, creating usernames that you’ll forget and other nonsense.

You didn’t have to delete the old one, just start a new one. I’m a Marine and I have numerous group chats with my Marines, some Android and some iPhone. I have the group chats broken down by rank, or special ones for passing word to a specific group of Marines. Anytime I need to add or delete someone from the group I just start a new one.

No reason to delete the old group. You solution makes no sense
 
  • Like
Reactions: barkomatic
Not get green bubbled, but get left out.

Android is still a pain in the arse.

Last week we all took a trip to my camp site up in Maine. We have a massive group chat with about 14 people in it. We went water rafting, paintballing, 4 wheeling, ate lots of greasy unhealthy foods, laid out in my deck watching the stars . Man We had a good ol’ time.

13 came except one. Guess what phone he was using ? Yup. A brand new “ FlagShip “ Galaxy S8.

He got none of the messages and had no idea we where even planning it out.

We did some research ( because he was not only offended and very concerned )

Since he went from a 7+ to an android device ( turned off his iMessage’s and everything ) he stopped receiving messages on group chats he was in while on the Apple boat.

So becuae of this, he received none of them going forward. What had to happen was.

All of us DELETE a group chat that is a little over 2 years old full of laughs, links, hysterical roasts of each other, screen shots, pictures of foods, recipe’s etc all because 1 person decided to upgrade to an android device. This is unethical and wrong.

So, he is now very much so enjoying his brand new iPhone 8 Plus after giving back his Galaxy S8 Plus that for some reason had a broken screen and damaged corners lol

No one is afraid of a green bubble. But afraid of getting left out or worse, someone think you’re ignorming them.

iMessage is brilliant and comes installed right out of the box.

No need for useless 3rd party apps, creating usernames that you’ll forget and other nonsense.

Why, hello, me. Same issue I've had for the last couple of years when I get the itch to switch. This is absolutely the worst bug ever. It's absolutely awful.
 
I don't know anybody that uses WhatsApp. They all use the native messaging app be it on Android or iOS. It must be a generational thing.
 
I know this was explicitly not the point of the OP, but the color of the bubble is so meaningless to me in comparison to the massive advantages of my phone being an iOS device. The fact that all chat is encrypted end-to-end with my friends and family members (almost all of them) that are on iOS devices, and that I can carry on the same conversations seamlessly between devices (all built in to the OS), etc ... I'd never leave iOS because I'd lose so much.

In comparison, the color of the bubble is beyond trivial.
 
I don't know anybody that uses WhatsApp. They all use the native messaging app be it on Android or iOS. It must be a generational thing.

I’m 30 years old in the UK and I’m basically the only person I know who doesn’t use WhatsApp 90% of the time. They’ve really cornered the market here.


Edit:
I work in a language school and basically all of the European and Latin American students have WhatsApp, the Chinese use WeChat, the Japanese use Line, and the Koreans all have ‘Kakao Talk’.
 
Last edited:
I’m 30 years old in the UK and I’m basically the only person I know who doesn’t use WhatsApp 90% of the time. They’ve really cornered the market here.

It’s the same why in Japan except they use Line. Video, phone, texting and a social aspect similar to other things
 
  • Like
Reactions: Diorama
i do not care about the green bubbles but group chats between iMessage users are nicer - for sure. I either use iMessage with my immediate family or text messaging with everyone else. I do not use any other app. My brother once tried to convince me to use Hangouts, I tried it out for 2 weeks and promptly uninstalled it and deleted the account. Back in the day, I also had some friends on Skype, but I removed all the contacts and stopped using the platform like 5 years ago.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.