So What's the Deal With iMessage?

[travod]

My cell phone plan has unlimited talk and text and 300mb of data. I just got my iPhone 5C today. I was sending texts all willy nilly (in retrospect, when I originally opened the phone today I don't remember if the texts I was sending were green or blue). I have my data turned off and so iMessage only works when I'm at home.

While I was out at my friend's house I wasn't getting any responses from people, and then when I got home a bunch of texts showed up.

Query: if I have iMessage turned off and someone sends me an iMessage, will I just not get it? Even now at home for a while I still haven't gotten text that my friends supposedly sent.

This is stupid. I thought it was pretty common to have unlimited text plans today anyway, so why don't people use them?

 

[Applejuiced]

Settings/messages/send as SMS when iMessage is unavailable.
Turn it to on and they should come in as texts when data is off.

 

[tateu]

Settings/messages/send as SMS when iMessage is unavailable.
Turn it to on and they should come in as texts when data is off.

I don't think that is true. Apple will not translate an iMessage into an SMS and forward it to you. If it leaves the other persons phone as an iMessage, it can only come in as an iMessage. If it leaves the other persons phone as an SMS, it can only come in as an SMS.

The setting that you referenced is for when you are sending a text message and iMessage is not available. Your phone will try it as an iMessage, if it fails it will resend it as an SMS.

Query: if I have iMessage turned off and someone sends me an iMessage, will I just not get it? Even now at home for a while I still haven't gotten text that my friends supposedly sent.

Older iMessages that were sent while your iMessage was disabled should all come in a batch, whenever you re-enable iMessage, either by turning on data or connecting to WiFi.

This is stupid. I thought it was pretty common to have unlimited text plans today anyway, so why don't people use them?

I don't know about the majority of people but with my AT&T plan, a text message addon would cost me another $20 US per month. I think that is nothing but a ridiculous ripoff. 90% of the people I know have iOS devices anyway, so I just use iMessage and there are tons of free messaging apps available for the other 10% of people I communicate with.

 

[T5BRICK]

Given the choice, I'd rather use FREE iMessage than pay $20 a month for unlimited texting. Unfortunately, I have a large group of friends that recently switched from iOS to Android, so now I pay for texting so I can easily keep in contact with them. Sending texts to my Google Voice number, but calling my regular number is just too confusing for some people...

 

[Applejuiced]

Thank you for the info tateu.
Makes sense how you explained it and the way it behaves then with the OP's phone.