Sending pictures uses mobile data

[enzie5454]

Hi all. Lately, whenever I send pictures via messages, the 4g symbol appears next to the wifi signal. While it's sending, only the 4g symbol and arrows light up and the arrows on the wifi symbol stay unlit.

Anyone else having this issue? A fix in the settings? I'd rather not use mobile data if I don't have to.

Thanks and happy New Year!

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[emad1995]

If you're sending pictures in a text message (mms) then it has to use mobile data. I have never heard of sending an mms with WiFi (correct me if I'm wrong)

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[enzie5454]

Yeah, I'm not sure exactly how it works. However, I never used to see the 4g symbol pop up when sending an mms.

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[Chuckcell]

I'm with emad. When I send text and pix I see the 4g icon. When I send text only it doesn't appear.

 

[jpr]

It depends if your carrier and firmware support wifi calling, such as Tmobile and I think Sprint. If so, you can set it to only use wifi calling and can turn off mobile data if you want and then it will send everything over wifi. If your carrier doesn't support it or you are running non-carrier firmware, then you have to use mobile data to send MMS.

Btw, I don't know what country you are in or what carrier you have, but if the reason you don't want it to use data is because of a data plan limit, in most cases MMS data is not applied to your data plan. It needs the mobile data connection to be sent and received but carriers do not charge you data for MMS - instead they apply MMS to your sms/mms plan charges.

So if you have unlimited text/MMS you will not have any extra charges. If you have a plan with a limited number of text/MMS then you will not be charged data for it either but your MMS message will just count as 1 message towards your monthly limit. If you are not in the US or not with a major carrier, then you should verify with your carrier if that is true since I've only used US carriers, but that is how it has worked at every carrier I've had.