React, reply, mention, edit, and send more than text

React, reply, edit, unsend

• React: long press a message and pick an emoji (on a computer, right click it or use the three-dot button beside it), or double tap it to send a ❤️. Tap a reaction under a message to see who reacted, and tap your own row there to take yours back.
• Reply: quote a specific message so it's clear what you're answering.
• Edit: fix one of your own messages. It's marked edited next to its time, which a tap on the message shows.
• Unsend: pull back one of your own messages within 15 minutes and it's gone, with just a small line saying you unsent it. After that, deleting leaves a quiet note that it was removed.
• Forward: send a message on to your other chats, several at once. Event chats aren't offered as a destination.

Mention someone

In a group, event, trip, or Space chat, type @ and start a name or handle, then pick the person from the list. In a group or a trip you can mention anyone in it. In an event chat or a big Space, the list offers the people who've posted in the chat. Mentions aren't offered in direct messages, where there's only one other person, or in chats with a venue or performer page.

The person you mention is notified even if they've muted the chat, and the notification opens the chat right on your message. Muting a chat is "not this thread", so a mention gets through it, but turning off Talk in Notification settings is "not Talk", and a mention respects that.

Send it later

Written something at 2am that doesn't need to land at 2am? Hold the send button and pick a time: in an hour, this evening, tomorrow morning, or a time you choose. A thin banner over the composer shows what's queued for that chat, and tapping it lets you cancel anything before it goes.

Send more than text

Tap the plus in the composer to add a photo (or take one), a video, or a GIF, to share an event, a trip, a Space, an Align plan, or a contact from your Orbit, or to start a poll. A file and your location are under More. For a voice note, tap the mic, which sits where the send button does while the box is empty, and you can listen back before it goes. Paste a link and it unfurls into a preview.

A poll takes a question and up to ten options. Turn on Allow multiple choices if people can pick more than one, or Anonymous votes if names shouldn't show, and set Closes to 1 day, 3 days, 1 week, or Doesn't close. Everyone votes right on the card in the chat. Polls work the same way on posts, in Spaces, and on an event's Prep tab.

Photos are resized on the way out, which keeps them quick to send and strips the location data a camera writes into a file. On the preview sheet there's an HD switch if you want the detail back on a particular photo, off by default because the bigger file is a real cost to everyone in the thread.

While something is uploading, the bubble shows how far along it is, with Cancel right there. If a batch fails partway, retrying only picks up what didn't land.

Tap a photo in a chat and it opens full screen, and you can page through everything sent in that conversation from there rather than scrolling back for it. Anything sent to you is yours to save or share on.

Read receipts

Your latest message shows who's caught up. In a direct message it says Delivered, then Read once they've seen it. In a group thread it says Read by and a count, and tapping it shows who. Event, trip, and Space chats don't show read receipts.

You can switch receipts off entirely in Privacy settings. It cuts both ways: turn yours off and you stop seeing everyone else's too. See Who can reach you.