4 ms·

The file size limits on iOS for MMS are far below what most carriers permit, making photos and videos sent from iPhone look much worse when sent via MMS.

inferiorhuman 3y ago
Doubt that. AT&T still limits attachments to 1 megabyte for picture, video, and audio files. That's not an iOS limitation. I just sent an animated GIF to a Google Voice number and it was compressed to about 800 kilobytes. I suspect the people whining the most are communicating with folks that have "Low Quality Image Mode" enabled on their iPhone. https://www.att.com/support/article/wireless/KM1041906/ https://www.att.com/support/article/wireless/KM1041906/
- ipaddr 3y ago
  Below are the limits per carrier. You are correct AT&T is 1m. The iphone has a limit of 200k which can be raised to 300k. Parent was correct. https://www.infobip.com/docs/mms/message-types https://www.infobip.com/docs/mms/message-types
  - inferiorhuman 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - pests 3y ago
      Their link references MMS not iMessage. How does Apple get around that MMS limitation?
      - inferiorhuman 3y ago
        How does Apple get around that MMS limitation? They don't, nobody does. Android users exchanging high quality media are using RCS, iPhone users exchanging high quality media are using iMessage. Fanbois pinning the blame for this on Apple are missing the role of telcos entirely.
        pests 3y ago
        Yes I know, it was sarcastic. They don't get around it, they use a different technology all together.
    - bmitc 3y ago
      Are you sending that to another iPhone? Trt exchanging text messages between an Android phone and an iPhone. It's completely broken. Apple wants to force Android users into iPhones so that their tect messages stop sucking, as if it's and Android issue.
      - tpmoney 3y ago
        Does the MMS protocol allow querying the receiving device capabilities? As far as I know it doesn't, and I don't know how else iOS would know the receiver is an android phone to be able to purposefully downgrade the experience just for them. Unless your theory here is that if a contact number is in your contacts list as ever being iMessage compatible that it will always use higher quality even when sending over MMS? That seems easily testable by sending to an iPhone over MMS, and then removing the contact from your address book and messages and sending again over MMS
        c0pium 3y ago
        Why would you think that discovery would have to be an SMS/MMS thing? Since you’ve never used an iPhone, let me explain the experience. When you type in a random new number it starts off green. If the user uses iMessage, once you finish typing it magically turns blue. Apple doesn’t care about whether the other number is an Android phone per se, although if it’s not using iMessage then it’s almost certain that the number routes to an android phone.
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
        tpmoney 3y ago
        Because the assertion was that the OP's experience with sending MMS media in excess of the supposed 200k limitation must have been because they were sending to an iPhone. In order for that to happen, the sending phone would have to know the receiving phone was an iPhone so that it could enable "send bigger pictures to iPhones over MMS" mode. They can't retroactively change the media size once they've sent the message, so either somehow Apple is determining the receiver capabilities over MMS before sending the message, or the 200k limit isn't real / is a carrier imposed limit.
    - johnoth 3y ago
      Now try sending to an at&t iPhone. By your experience it seems that Apple is limiting iOS-iOS image size, to promote iMessage. That's inherently not a bad thing, and wouldn't matter if iMessage wasn't a platform gatekeeping/discrimination tool. I say discrimination because of the GenZ opinion on blue/green bubbles.
      - inferiorhuman 3y ago
        Now try sending to an at&t iPhone. Why? Sending a message to a Google Voice number will always happen over SMS or MMS. iMessage does not work over GV. RCS does not work over GV. If you mean try receiving messages from an AT&T Android phone, sure, I've done that. No complaints, although AT&T seems to throttle the image size more than other carriers in my experience. By your experience it seems that Apple is limiting iOS-iOS image size, to promote iMessage What? If I were sending messages to an iOS device directly it would go out over iMessage. Instead I chose to send a message via MMS to a Google Voice number where Google serves as the end device. iMessage does not work over Google Voice. There. Is. No. 200. Kilobyte. Limit. There's no gatekeeping, just shitty carrier MMS implementations.
- xp84 3y ago
  The other thing though is that even if attachment limit were not a thing, I don’t think it’s spec compliant to send a video codec other than 3GP or whatever the format is formally called (ironically it’s a QuickTime format dating back to when 3G was an exciting up and coming standard and the iPhone didn’t exist). If you sent an h.264 for instance, many flip phones would be unable to play it. So I think the MMS standard itself is holding us back. I still blame Apple. If they prioritized the experience of their own customers above the value of the blue bubble in getting teens to bully Android users they could have obviously been the ones pushing a good RCS implementation with carriers by threatening credibly to drop MMS support. Instead they left it to carriers and Google who each screwed things up pretty well.
  - inferiorhuman 3y ago
    H.264 is indeed part of the MMS spec. As for which carriers support it, who knows.

inferiorhuman 3y ago

Doubt that. AT&T still limits attachments to 1 megabyte for picture, video, and audio files. That's not an iOS limitation. I just sent an animated GIF to a Google Voice number and it was compressed to about 800 kilobytes. I suspect the people whining the most are communicating with folks that have "Low Quality Image Mode" enabled on their iPhone. https://www.att.com/support/article/wireless/KM1041906/ https://www.att.com/support/article/wireless/KM1041906/

ipaddr 3y ago
Below are the limits per carrier. You are correct AT&T is 1m. The iphone has a limit of 200k which can be raised to 300k. Parent was correct. https://www.infobip.com/docs/mms/message-types https://www.infobip.com/docs/mms/message-types
- inferiorhuman 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - pests 3y ago
    Their link references MMS not iMessage. How does Apple get around that MMS limitation?
    - inferiorhuman 3y ago
      How does Apple get around that MMS limitation? They don't, nobody does. Android users exchanging high quality media are using RCS, iPhone users exchanging high quality media are using iMessage. Fanbois pinning the blame for this on Apple are missing the role of telcos entirely.
      - pests 3y ago
        Yes I know, it was sarcastic. They don't get around it, they use a different technology all together.
  - bmitc 3y ago
    Are you sending that to another iPhone? Trt exchanging text messages between an Android phone and an iPhone. It's completely broken. Apple wants to force Android users into iPhones so that their tect messages stop sucking, as if it's and Android issue.
    - tpmoney 3y ago
      Does the MMS protocol allow querying the receiving device capabilities? As far as I know it doesn't, and I don't know how else iOS would know the receiver is an android phone to be able to purposefully downgrade the experience just for them. Unless your theory here is that if a contact number is in your contacts list as ever being iMessage compatible that it will always use higher quality even when sending over MMS? That seems easily testable by sending to an iPhone over MMS, and then removing the contact from your address book and messages and sending again over MMS
      - c0pium 3y ago
        Why would you think that discovery would have to be an SMS/MMS thing? Since you’ve never used an iPhone, let me explain the experience. When you type in a random new number it starts off green. If the user uses iMessage, once you finish typing it magically turns blue. Apple doesn’t care about whether the other number is an Android phone per se, although if it’s not using iMessage then it’s almost certain that the number routes to an android phone.
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
        tpmoney 3y ago
        Because the assertion was that the OP's experience with sending MMS media in excess of the supposed 200k limitation must have been because they were sending to an iPhone. In order for that to happen, the sending phone would have to know the receiving phone was an iPhone so that it could enable "send bigger pictures to iPhones over MMS" mode. They can't retroactively change the media size once they've sent the message, so either somehow Apple is determining the receiver capabilities over MMS before sending the message, or the 200k limit isn't real / is a carrier imposed limit.
  - johnoth 3y ago
    Now try sending to an at&t iPhone. By your experience it seems that Apple is limiting iOS-iOS image size, to promote iMessage. That's inherently not a bad thing, and wouldn't matter if iMessage wasn't a platform gatekeeping/discrimination tool. I say discrimination because of the GenZ opinion on blue/green bubbles.
    - inferiorhuman 3y ago
      Now try sending to an at&t iPhone. Why? Sending a message to a Google Voice number will always happen over SMS or MMS. iMessage does not work over GV. RCS does not work over GV. If you mean try receiving messages from an AT&T Android phone, sure, I've done that. No complaints, although AT&T seems to throttle the image size more than other carriers in my experience. By your experience it seems that Apple is limiting iOS-iOS image size, to promote iMessage What? If I were sending messages to an iOS device directly it would go out over iMessage. Instead I chose to send a message via MMS to a Google Voice number where Google serves as the end device. iMessage does not work over Google Voice. There. Is. No. 200. Kilobyte. Limit. There's no gatekeeping, just shitty carrier MMS implementations.
xp84 3y ago
The other thing though is that even if attachment limit were not a thing, I don’t think it’s spec compliant to send a video codec other than 3GP or whatever the format is formally called (ironically it’s a QuickTime format dating back to when 3G was an exciting up and coming standard and the iPhone didn’t exist). If you sent an h.264 for instance, many flip phones would be unable to play it. So I think the MMS standard itself is holding us back. I still blame Apple. If they prioritized the experience of their own customers above the value of the blue bubble in getting teens to bully Android users they could have obviously been the ones pushing a good RCS implementation with carriers by threatening credibly to drop MMS support. Instead they left it to carriers and Google who each screwed things up pretty well.
- inferiorhuman 3y ago
  H.264 is indeed part of the MMS spec. As for which carriers support it, who knows.