Are there any Android Free Texting Apps?

[vicw926a4]

I'm getting close to a switchover from my iPhone 3g to Droidx, and finally got down to looking at the cost of Verizon cell plans. I was quite surprised to see that Verizon appears to price its unlimited text plan at a $20 per month premium, with no incremental text plans offered.

I don't text very often, but when I have some timely exchange going, I hate to meter out the texts at $.20 per, in both directions.

I have been using FreeText on the iPhone, which has worked beautifully for me, but I haven't been able to find anything comparable to it on the Android side. If not, I may reconsider the EVO as an alternative. Is there something like a TextFree Android app alternative?

 

[avacomputers]

Google voice offers free unlimited texting.

 

[vicw926a4]

Google voice offers free unlimited texting.

Thanks. I'll give it a try. I had used it on the iPhone, but was only able to get free outbound texts - the inbounds always ended up on the $.20 register at ATT, and I switched to FreeText.

Hopefully, the inbound problem was due to constraints by Apple on Google Voice dictated by their dictator, and the Android version will perform up to its full potential.

 

[Incrediboy]

if you install the android gvoice app on your phone.. its much nicer than using email or fwding out to your phone.

 

[vicw926a4]

That sounds more like a configuration issue. If you have Google Voice set up to forward texts to your phone, of course it will charge you for incoming. Set it up to forward to your email, for instance, and you will get an email notification (with Gmail at least this is pretty instantaneous) and can read the sms from your email, and I think reply to it from email as well.

I'm not completely sure about any of the above as I don't believe in phones without unlimited text messages so have never had to worry about such a thing.

I did have it set up on the iPhone NOT to forward text to the mobile, and did have it set to forward to email, but the inbound messages still showed up as SMS AND email. At this point, I'm no longer really worried how it performed on the iPhone, as it will be out of business in a couple of weeks. As long as Google Voice performs properly on Android, and I can avoid that crazy $20 per month subscription for texting, I'll be happy.

 

[takeshi]

GV is all I use for SMS.

You can also send/receive SMS on any internet connected PC via the GV site.

 

[vicw926a4]

GV is all I use for SMS.

You can also send/receive SMS on any internet connected PC via the GV site.

Thanks. Are you able to send and receive free texts via GV on your phone via the cellular network as well?

 

[Genetic_Bloom]

Yeah, you are.

 

[frunkiss]

I believe Google Voice uses data to send and receive texts. Your would need wifi or a data plan to use it on you phone