Nexus 5, 'Hangouts' app - recommendations for SMS messenger alternatives?

[mikeymikec]

I've had my Nexus 5 for a couple of weeks and I'm still not particularly happy with the Hangouts app on it for SMS texting. I don't use G+ on my phone so that side of things is irrelevant for me. I'm quite happy with the default texting app that I've seen on most Android phones.

 

[tsupersonic]

I use GoSMSPro for it's customization options. The one feature I need is repeating notifications - where it repeats the sound/vibration every x minutes until I acknowledge the text (I use my phone to get pages - useful for on-call).

 

[trmiv]

I use Verizon Messaging, but since you're in the UK not going to work for you. Other than that, 8sms and Textra are very nice.

 

[vshah]

there are several clones of the AOSP messaging app on the play store that you can download

 

[NightFox]

Textra.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.textra

 

[kaerflog]

I use Textra. Its the only one I was able to figure out group texting.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

TBH in terms of full features, GoSMS is still tops. It's full of customization including LED control, vibration length, popup customization, repeat reminders, group MMS, blacklist capabilities, private box, backup, blah blah blah. It's got search capabilities by message AND contact, which is huge.

The big downside is it's spammy and it's bloated.

Textra - Good features, but could be more #HoloYolo

8SMS - Just like the CyanogenMod SMS/MMS app which is based on AOSP. However, AOSP is somehow very slow. Just scroll through a list of 50 text messages. Look how slow that scrolls compared to say a huge list of Gmails.

Evolve/Sliding Messenger - These kids are in college, and it's cool they're so talented, but in many ways this is more a hobby/side project than something professional. They still can't address the fact that their app load so slow and can't handle large amounts of messages when most other apps can do just fine. Evolve seems to be better, but what's to prevent these guys from doing another reboot and you throw your money away again?

Hello SMS - Seems to be the best new app right now, but they need some more features.


Something that most apps lack - Searching SMS would be critical. I hate trying to find an 8 month old SMS conversation with a friend. Instead I end up typing their name to start a new thread and to see what old messages there were. It also makes it hard when some people have 2+ numbers, and I forget which one is their text #. It would be helpful to have a search by contact, and GoSMS seems to accomplish this nicely.

 

[blairharrington]

I'm using Hello SMS. I like it a great deal.

 

[Occ]

I use 8SMS. You can even change the icon to be the old AOSP icon. I like its simplicity; it also scrolls plenty fast on my Nexus 5.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Sorry I withdraw my comment about slow scrolling. I think that's mainly Google Voice. Goddamn that app is terrible.

 

[MSCoder610]

Also using Textra on my Nexus 5.

 

[LtMikePowelll]

I use GoSMS for my Note 3, since I don't like how the TouchWiz SMS app look and less functionality.

 

[RossMAN]

Has anyone heard of or used Glowfly? Yes it's a whopping $0.99 but I like the features and might give it a shot.

http://www.glowflyapp.com/#features

 

[Sheep]

Has anyone heard of or used Glowfly? Yes it's a whopping $0.99 but I like the features and might give it a shot.

http://www.glowflyapp.com/#features

I haven't tried Glowfly but it looks promising. For similar popup notifications, I've been using NotifyMe (it's barebones but works well with every SMS/MMS app I've tried, Hangouts and CBS Sports, the three apps I use the most that I want to see notifications from). Currently trying AcDisplay which comes at notifications from a slightly different angle (slide down on a custom lockscreen to see the notification).

I think I'm the sole proponent of Sliding Messenger here. I haven't seen the problems Delerium noted but I'm not a heavy texter (I have maybe 6,000 SMS/MMS messages total among my contacts). It works perfectly for me and I love the look (Hangouts layout with the pitch black theme) and interface. Evolve is getting there but has a few annoying quirks to be ironed out.

 

[Zxian]

Textra.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.textra

Haha, they use the Good Girl Gina image for their example screenshots...

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

I haven't tried Glowfly but it looks promising. For similar popup notifications, I've been using NotifyMe (it's barebones but works well with every SMS/MMS app I've tried, Hangouts and CBS Sports, the three apps I use the most that I want to see notifications from). Currently trying AcDisplay which comes at notifications from a slightly different angle (slide down on a custom lockscreen to see the notification).

I think I'm the sole proponent of Sliding Messenger here. I haven't seen the problems Delerium noted but I'm not a heavy texter (I have maybe 6,000 SMS/MMS messages total among my contacts). It works perfectly for me and I love the look (Hangouts layout with the pitch black theme) and interface. Evolve is getting there but has a few annoying quirks to be ironed out.

6000 is fine, but the app takes forever to start. And then after you start it, it lags sliding contact to contact as it loads messages. The "Load more messages" button was only added after people complained to the devs that they should be able to keep their 6000 messages. I have something like 14k, so it's not like huge or anything. My issue with the app was that the dev kept telling people to delete their SMS/MMS instead of really solving the issue. Sliding MMessenger came out when FusionIM came out on Reddit. Fusion allowed you to slide between contact to contact too and everything was blazing fast. No long load times either. So the question to SM devs was that if other people can do it, why can't they?

 

[sweenish]

Yeah, Sliding and evolve get chunky really fast.

I'm on a GNex, and Hangouts, hello, Textra, Ninja(now hover, i guess), etc. never do this.

Their apps are great and they have all the features and options I want, but they need a LOT of under the hood improvements. With Sliding all but abandoned, I'm out a dollar. Evolve keeps texting the wrong people because it won't update the order of the conversations visually.

Good guys, they just need some more time to let their skills get to the level required for a smooth app.

I haven't looked at Textra's terms, but hello sells your information. It's also a bit too minimalistic for my tastes (gets difficult to distinguish who is saying what), and I loathe that both Textra and hello don't use Android emoji on KitKat.

Maybe in a few updates, evolve will be the app for me, but right now I'm using Textra. If they also sell my information to third parties, I'll be back on Hangouts. At least Google keeps my information to themselves.

 

[WelshBloke]

6000 is fine, but the app takes forever to start. And then after you start it, it lags sliding contact to contact as it loads messages. The "Load more messages" button was only added after people complained to the devs that they should be able to keep their 6000 messages. I have something like 14k, so it's not like huge or anything. My issue with the app was that the dev kept telling people to delete their SMS/MMS instead of really solving the issue. Sliding MMessenger came out when FusionIM came out on Reddit. Fusion allowed you to slide between contact to contact too and everything was blazing fast. No long load times either. So the question to SM devs was that if other people can do it, why can't they?

Seriously, back that shit up to somewhere appropriate.

 

[Sheep]

6000 is fine, but the app takes forever to start.

I've never seen this behavior on either my Galaxy Nexus or my current Nexus 5. When I open the app after rebooting my phone (meaning it's not already running in the background), it opens instantly and I see the messages from the last person I texted--no choppiness or lag, no long load times. The same happens when I slide the app off my recent apps list and try accessing it again a few minutes later. I don't know what happens for people with tens of thousands of texts--just conveying my experiences with the app.

Evolve keeps texting the wrong people because it won't update the order of the conversations visually.

This was pretty much the quirk I was referring to. The other one was if you look at an image sent via MMS, it always reverts back to the most recent messages once you're done rather than putting you back where you were. Strange as it may sound, that's the dealbreaker for me with Evolve.