What are the best messaging apps for the Note 9

[Brad Bilger]

I don't use the customer tones anymore. I didn't even miss it when they took it away. Lol I like being able to look at my phone and see a custom notification icon. right now if I get a text and the icon is a heart, that means my mom just texted me. Textra allows me to do this , but I wanted to try another app with the same ability.

I lived by the custom tones. If I get a automated text message from my pharmacy wanting to know if I want to refill my meds, I had them set with a quiet, tiny little beep. That way I know who it is and that I don't have to rush to answer a computer. On the other hand, I get text messages from my alarm company. I wanted something that says ANSWER ME RIGHT NOW!
The other problem I had was group messages. I assign a tone to Friend A, a tone to Friend B and a tone to Friend C. Works great on a one on one conversation. And in a group text, I know Who it is texting without having to look at my phone. Where the system (?) now only plays the default tone no matter who in the group is responding OR it plays a tone that I've assigned to the group thread. I like the way it was because about 75% of my messages are group/family/Co workers.

 

[Brad Bilger]

"Brad, I'm using Mood and I can set custom text tones for all of my contacts. I was annoyed that it was removed from the stock app, too which was why I switched to Mood. Haven't had any problems."

Sigh.. Close, but no cigar. Just downloaded Mood again and yes, you can assign individual text tones to specific people/Senders... BUT, it does it the same way that the standard program does it. By tagging the thread in a way. But Group conversations are still lacking.
Try this.. You have Friend A with Tone A. Friend B with Tone B. Send a message to Friend A and the reply comes back with Friend A's tone. The same occurs with Friend B. BUT, if you send a Group text message to Friend A AND Friend B at the same time, when Friend A replies, you get the default tone. When Friend B replies in the same conversation, you get the default tone.
Mood gets you half way there. You don't have to save the conversation thread. But about 75% of my text conversations are Group/Family/Co workers... Under Nougat, and before, the customization was assigned to the contact. No matter how the message came in, individual or group, that custom tone was played for that person. But now, with Mood, if I get a text from Person A, I get Person A's tone. But if Person A is responding to a Group text, I get the default tone. Sigh... Why did they change it??