GEAR S3 messaging Woes

JayinKy

Member
Jul 12, 2014
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I have a Gear S3, a note 5 and love them both. I have two issues that irritate me. Both are related to messaging.

1. I want to use Textra or similar for messaging. I do not like the stock app. When I set Textra as the default app on my phone my Gear S3 tells me that its unable to receive messages and to change the default messaging app to messages. Doing so resolves the issue but then I am back to using the stock app. I am sure others use Textra and other apps than just the stock app with the Gear S3.

2. My Gear S3 is the LTE version and every time I go solo without my phone, The messaging app on my watch downloads all the messages I have had since the last time I was away from my phone and marks them as unread instead just the new ones going forward. I have to acknowledge each of those.

Any help would be appreciated.
 
I have the same issues as you, I can only help with the 1st one. Sorry.

I use Handcent for texting and when I get the message you described, I hit the x and it works fine. I haven't been able to find out how to stop it all together yet.

The 2nd issue drives me nuts. Hopefully some has figured this out.
 
I use signal and gear notification extender. I don't get old messages again. I think that's in the settings.
 
I use signal and gear notification extender. I don't get old messages again. I think that's in the settings.

This sounds promising but I can not find anything on sign as long and gear notification extender.

Is the settings on the Samsung phone app or on the watch?

I searched for apps in Android and Galaxy app stores. I even Googled it. I can find no reference to it.
 
I use Textra and so far, have some success. I turn off notifications in the Gear app for the stock Messaging app. I turn ON notifications for Textra. On watch, I get Textra notifications and even can reply to them. I can not compose a new message, only reply to one I get (I have asked Textra a couple times to produce a Textra app for the watch, maybe others here can also request it). So far, all my text messages get through to my watch.
 
I have gotten Textra to work well now. Thank you for your help.

Othyer than using data is there any drawbacks to running just LTE and disabling bluetooth?
 
Othyer than using data is there any drawbacks to running just LTE and disabling bluetooth?
From what I've seen, there is nothing that can be done with BT, that can't also be done via remote connection. It may use more battery life, but it's more stable.
 
I have so many problems with MMS everyday. Any extra messages wouldn't show if I didn't check them. No incoming messages showed in watch app history. I've heard of stand alone mode and updating date and time in settings fixes it. No pictures were showing too. But I have the T-Mobile variant and don't like the sim line I have on watch.

Using the digits beta with the pixel xl and it's perfect. Any and all messages now come into the watch with the entire message history and SMS pictures. They sync to my Google messenger default app and digits app too. AT&T has something similar but I recommend trying number sync.

Also there was an update recently which shows multiple messages in the notification window. Samsung is still improving the watch which I love.
 
From what I've seen, there is nothing that can be done with BT, that can't also be done via remote connection. It may use more battery life, but it's more stable.

I started with a BT connection all the time and was getting 72 hrs on the watch battery once it stabilized but my phone battery was getting murdered. After starting the T-Mo Digits beta I've gone to using the remote connection via LTE and it works better overall for me. The watch has gotten to 60-72 hours and my phone has returned to normal.
 
Yes I would like to know how you got it working, i have same issue and cant get it to allow me to reply either.

Thanks
Jim
 
I have a Gear S3, a note 5 and love them both. I have two issues that irritate me. Both are related to messaging.

1. I want to use Textra or similar for messaging. I do not like the stock app. When I set Textra as the default app on my phone my Gear S3 tells me that its unable to receive messages and to change the default messaging app to messages. Doing so resolves the issue but then I am back to using the stock app. I am sure others use Textra and other apps than just the stock app with the Gear S3.

2. My Gear S3 is the LTE version and every time I go solo without my phone, The messaging app on my watch downloads all the messages I have had since the last time I was away from my phone and marks them as unread instead just the new ones going forward. I have to acknowledge each of those.

Any help would be appreciated.

I have the second issue and it drives me crazy!

Any help would be appreciated.
 
My phone is a BlackBerry Priv with BlackBerry apps and I don't have either of these problems. To be fair. I have limited notifications for most of the apps and I don't do much texting, just email.
 
Its all in the setup. I have Digits from TMob and that works pretty well but I still need to NOT set Remote Connect in Gear App and I keep my watch Wifi ON and Mobile Connection to Auto. And that works only when my watch shows Connected Remotely on the pull down screen. This seems to work but I soft reset the watch (turn on-off) every day when I put it on just to make sure there aren't any glitches.
 
I just swapped out for a LTE version today and #2 got me while my phone was rebooting.

To make it worse I was replying to a text on the watch and #1 happened when the phone came back. It wiped out the response I had been working on.

It's hard to give up Textra.

When I had a V20 phone the messaging on the watch didn't work unless you directly reponded to a notification. That seems preferable to this behavior.
 
I gave in and went to Messenger. :(

But no more #2 . :)

Although Messenger isn't too bad. It's on par with Textra with some features but has fewer UI customizations.
 
There is a new app called Textra which solved everything and now I can get my notifications on my S3. Make sure you set it as your default app. It is free and works great.
 

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