Question about SMS relay pertaining to a data only iPhone plan...

[soufflegirl]

Ok,
So my carrier (Rogers Canada) has increased the price of their plans enormously and they refuse to upgrade my iPhone unless I switch to a more expensive plan. So I recently signed up for a data only tablet plan. It works perfectly on my iPhone and is about 1/5th the price of a plan as the usual plans include a bunch of minutes and texts that I don't use. I would like to have the option to send a few texts a month, if need be, and would prefer they come from my regular number.

What I'm wondering is this;

- Do standard text rates apply when sending texts (not iMessages) from your iPad? I'm assuming they do but I can't find the info anywhere.

Thanks so much!

 

[Weiser878]

You can't send a text that's not an iMessage without having a phone plan (at least in the US, I don't know that it would be different in Canada though)
SMS is over the phone line, iMessage is data

 

[soufflegirl]

You can't send a text that's not an iMessage without having a phone plan (at least in the US, I don't know that it would be different in Canada though)
SMS is over the phone line, iMessage is data

Well how are we sending SMS (green bubbles) through our iPads and MacBooks with SMS relay? Isn't that just data?

Pretty sure you're right though, the phone needs to be on to forward the text messages, so won't be able to send actual SMS messages without a plan that supports it.

 

[dhlizard]

As the name implies "sms relay", the iPhone is actually sending the messages using the messages function of your cellular plan, they are relayed to/from the other devices.

 

[gordon1234]

Well how are we sending SMS (green bubbles) through our iPads and MacBooks with SMS relay? Isn't that just data?

Pretty sure you're right though, the phone needs to be on to forward the text messages, so won't be able to send actual SMS messages without a plan that supports it.

SMS messages are not just data at all. They go through a special part of the cellular connection called the Control Channel (that's where the 160-character limit comes from.) SMS relay sends the content of your message as data packets to your phone, which then transmits it as a standard SMS via the control channel. No voice/text plan, no SMS.

 

[soufflegirl]

Thanks all, I think it all makes sense to me now. Much appreciated!