Apple will let you send text messages via satellites in space later this year

Apple (AAPL) Intelligence may have stolen the show at the company’s Worldwide Developers Conference this week, but another announcement during the show could literally help you stay in touch with friends and family when you are off-grid or camping when you don’t have cell service. .

Satellite Messages is a new feature for the iPhone 14 and iPhone 15 coming in iOS 18 that will allow you to send iMessages, you guessed it, via satellite. Apple already offers its SOS emergency service via satellite, but it is more suited to serious situations, such as when a user is lost in the wilderness or in another type of danger. Satellite Emergency SOS requires users to respond to brief prompts regarding their particular situation, which Apple can then route to the appropriate authorities.

Unlike Satellite Emergency SOS, Satellite Messages lets you send standard iMessages to friends and family who use iPhones, as well as SMS messages to Android users. I joined Kurt Knight, Apple’s senior director of platform product marketing for iOS, iPadOS and macOS, for a brief demonstration of the new feature and its capabilities.

Standing outside in the sweltering California heat, Knight showed me how the process of sending satellite texts using an iPhone without a cellular or Wi-Fi connection works. From the lock screen of your phone, you will receive a notification that you can send and search messages via satellite when your iPhone detects that you do not have a cellular or Wi-Fi signal.

Tap the notification and you’ll be taken to a screen showing your location on a map and whether there’s a satellite nearby. Below are the options to send messages, call roadside assistance, use the Find My app, or use Emergency SOS via satellite.

You can also launch Messages via Satellite by opening the Messages app on your phone when you’re disconnected from cellular or Wi-Fi. When using the app, you’ll get a pop-up in your iPhone’s Dynamic Island showing your relative location relative to the nearest satellite. Move too far left or right and the pop-up will ask you to return to the correct position to communicate with the satellite.

You won’t be able to use this feature indoors or under heavy tree cover, as it requires a clear line of sight between the satellite and your iPhone, but it works surprisingly quickly. During the demo, Knight was able to send both text and an emoji through iMessage, as well as one of Apple’s Tapback message replies.

The Messages app will alert you every time you send or receive a satellite text message by adding a small note above the timestamp of your message. The idea is to make sure that you and the person you are texting are both aware that you are communicating via satellite and that responses might not be as fast as they would be via cellular or Wi-Fi signals .

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Don’t expect to send videos or photos via satellite, though. Apple claims that it was able to make sending normal texts possible because it was able to compress them to a size that made them easier to send to satellites. Photos and videos are just too big at this point.

As for using satellite messages, you’ll need an iPhone 14 or newer and access to iOS 18 when it releases later this fall. Apple has not yet said when or how much it will charge for the service. The company initially offered iPhone 14 users one year of free service, but later extended that for another year in 2023. iPhone 15 owners also got a year of free service when they bought their phone. Apple has not yet announced what will happen once these conditions expire.

Email Daniel Howley at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at @DanielHowley.

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