How can I forward/sync carrier SMS text messages to another phone?

[clh42]

Two phones, different #'s, different carriers (if that matters). I'd like to be able to forward and respond to SMS text messages from one phone on the other phone. (I'm doing the normal call-forward for voice calls.)

FIRST, am I correct that Google no longer has any apps that do this, at least in the way I want?

My understanding is that Google Hangouts USED to be able to do this, but that Google stripped handling of carrier SMS back in 2017 (and Hangouts in general will die in the new future anyway). Google Voice I think can do it, but I'd have to port one of the #'s to Google Voice, which I also don't want to do. Google Voice cannot directly handle carrier SMS. The Google Messages app has a feature to sync with a PC, but cannot sync with the Messages app itself on other devices.

The other primary app I found that might handle it is "MySMS."

Otherwise, any suggestions for other apps I should look at?

Thank you.

 

[B. Diddy]

I wouldn't call it porting, per se -- that implies completely transferring a number over to another service. You can assign multiple actual phone numbers to be covered by one Google Voice number, so any call you get to any of those phone numbers rings through the same Google Voice number. Google Voice can indeed handle SMS (my wife uses it all the time), but she doesn't have multiple cell lines, so I can't say for sure how it would handle SMS from more than one cell line (although I think it wouldn't be a problem).

Google Voice is free, so it won't hurt to give it a try.

 

[clh42]

Hmm, yes, if someone can explain how Google Voice handles carrier-based SMS, I would give it a try. Everything I've read seems to indicate that GV can't handle carrier SMS. People say they're using GV for SMS, but it's SMS via their GV #, not their native cell carrier SMS.

But yes, if it works with native carrier SMS somehow, I'd definitely give it a try.

 

[B. Diddy]

Oh I'm sorry, you're right -- I just checked with my wife, and she said SMS to her native cell number does not go through Google Voice. Sorry for the wrong info!:-\

 

[clh42]

No problem. Thanks for the confirmation.

Would still like to hear if anyone else has other ideas.

 

[clh42]

Thought I'd add what I ended up doing, if anyone else has the same need.

I went ahead and did MySMS. It works pretty well. Sync is almost instantaneous, within a couple seconds. The only real issue I've had with it so far is that I've been unable to send a photo via text message using the MySMS client. It tries but fails and I haven't figured out why. But regular text MMS with multiple recipients works just fine.

My only minor complaint is that you do have to use their MySMS client for SMS/MMS for the number you are mirroring. It works, and it's okay, but it's pretty basic.

On the phone you're really using, you use the MySMS "Forward" software (see below) for the mirrored number texting, but you can still use any other texting app for SMS for the native number ON that phone.

It does require a premium subscription to use the feature to sync with another phone (vs. syncing with a computer via web browser). You can trial the Premium (and thus the SMS sync between two phones) for 14 days, thought it will make you provide a credit card to even trial, and you'll need to remember to cancel it before the 14 days to avoid being charged if you don't want it. That said, the Premium subscription is only $9.99 per YEAR, so not bad.

Here are details on setting it up.

Install the main "MySMS" on the phone who's SMS you want to mirror to the other phone, and create your MySMS Premium account. You must set MySMS as the default messaging app on that source phone, but that's not a big deal since you won't actually be using that phone (that's the whole point of doing this, right?). Then install the MySMS "Forward SMS texting w/ 2phones" app on the phone you actually want to use and sign in to your MySMS Premium account when launching that app.

The first time you launch each app on each device it will sync existing texts and contacts from the source phone. I don't quite know why it syncs contacts but there is no way to disable that sync. In my case, my contacts are stored in my online account, which is already set up and and synced to both phones. But it doesn't seem to hurt anything with MySMS syncing contacts either.

By default it also syncs the call log from the source phone, so if you don't want that go into MySMS settings on the source phone and disable that. It won't forward actual phone calls, it just syncs the call log.