Technical FAQ
Bounces, limits, subdomains, multi-recipient sending, and sender rules.
Want the basics first? Go back to the
General FAQ.
If your email bounced, it bounced for a reason. The bounce message will indicate what went wrong.
It could be that you are over your account’s limits, it could be that our filter detected your message as marketing
(which isn’t allowed), or another reason. Read the details of the bounce.
If you have a free account, you can send 10 total SMS messages. After 10, you must subscribe to a paid account.
Yes. You can put multiple
your-number@your-subdomain.text.email addresses in the To, Cc, or Bcc line,
and each of them will still receive an individual SMS.
Yes. You can change it from your account’s settings page, but once you change it,
any emails sent to your old subdomain will bounce and not convert to an SMS.
Because sending text messages like this is heavily regulated, and each country has their own protocols
for allowing software to send SMS messages. We’re working on adding other countries.
With text.email, a subdomain is a word that is assigned to you when you create an account.
If your subdomain is
yoga, then you will send emails to your-number@yoga.text.email, for example.
This is how we assign messages to the right account. Every user with text.email has a unique subdomain.
Sending without a subdomain is meant for testing only, just to show prospective users that the service works.
You’re only allowed to send a few messages to
your-number@text.email (without a subdomain), before your messages begin bouncing.
You don’t specify the “from” addresses. Any “from” address can send to your
@your-subdomain.text.email address to generate a text message.
That’s why it’s important to keep your subdomain private, since anyone who knows your subdomain can then send emails to
your-number@your-subdomain.text.email and have it count towards YOUR account.
We use the plain-text part of your email whenever it’s available. If your email doesn’t include a plain-text body
but does include an HTML body, we’ll fall back to the HTML and convert it into SMS-friendly text.
When we convert HTML, we:
When we convert HTML, we:
- Remove
<head>,<style>,<script>, and HTML comments - Try to remove “hidden preheader” content (best-effort)
- Turn common formatting into readable text (line breaks, paragraphs, and bullets)
- Preserve links in a compact way (for example:
Reset password (https://...)when it fits) - Strip remaining tags, decode entities, and normalize whitespace
- Try to cut off large quoted/forwarded sections
Finally, we combine Subject + Body (when both exist) and cap the SMS to 160 characters.
Yes — links and email addresses are allowed in text.email messages.
However, messages that contain URLs (and sometimes email addresses) can take longer to deliver because our upstream SMS providers and carrier networks often run extra automated checks on messages that look like they include clickable content. That can introduce a short delay compared to a plain text-only message.
If speed matters most, keep the message simple (no links). If you need a link, it’s fine — just expect delivery to occasionally be a bit slower.
However, messages that contain URLs (and sometimes email addresses) can take longer to deliver because our upstream SMS providers and carrier networks often run extra automated checks on messages that look like they include clickable content. That can introduce a short delay compared to a plain text-only message.
If speed matters most, keep the message simple (no links). If you need a link, it’s fine — just expect delivery to occasionally be a bit slower.
No. text.email is SMS-only, which means it can deliver text but not images, videos, or other MMS media.
If your email contains inline images or image attachments, they won’t be delivered as a picture in the SMS. At most, you may see any text that was in the email (and possibly a link to an image if your email provider included one as plain text).
If you need someone to receive an image, host it somewhere and include the link in the email body.
If your email contains inline images or image attachments, they won’t be delivered as a picture in the SMS. At most, you may see any text that was in the email (and possibly a link to an image if your email provider included one as plain text).
If you need someone to receive an image, host it somewhere and include the link in the email body.
This can happen after we review your account activity. We sometimes move legitimate users to a different SMS provider
as part of ongoing anti-spam and deliverability improvements.
When that happens, the “from” number recipients see may change, and future replies will go back through the new number. The service still works the same — it’s just backed by a more reliable routing/provider for better delivery.
When that happens, the “from” number recipients see may change, and future replies will go back through the new number. The service still works the same — it’s just backed by a more reliable routing/provider for better delivery.
Still stuck? Check the bounce reason first — it’s usually the fastest way to pinpoint what happened.