# Why is my cell phone doing this? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 26, 2018, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123 "2018-11-26T19:37:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2018, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/1 "2018-11-26T19:37:59Z")
Android. T- Mobile. A few weeks ago when I’d get a text from The Missus (for nobody else wants to send me a text, so disagreeable is my personality in real life) my phone would tell me, “Yo dude, you got TWO messages”. There would be only one message, so I just figured my phone was having trouble with the whole counting thing and promptly didn’t care. However, much like a burning urine stream, the miscount seems to have been indicative of a larger problem. Today, my phone now tells me I have SIX messages for each actual one text received. To belabor the ill-fitting metaphor, the burning is really bad now but everything is still working so… Oh! A question? Yeah, so, like, why is my phone doing that? I’ve ruled out cell tower echoes (if those are even a thing, I think I made them up just now) because it happens no matter where I am. My brother says it’s evidence of The GovernmentFinterceptingNandOforwardingRmyDtexts. I am dubious because he can be just as nutty as that theory sometimes, but I haven’t ruled it out. The Missus and I get pretty naughty over the texts sometimes. ---
**Author:** ![Knowed\_Out](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/knowed_out/32/7380_2.png) [@Knowed\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knowed_Out)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2018, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/2 "2018-11-27T02:05:02Z")
I have no idea why, but whenever my phone goes into weird mode like that, I reboot it. The other day I got a call from a friend. I couldn’t answer it because the call hung up and repeated the process 10 more times. When I tried calling the friend, it did the hang-up-and-call-10-times routine again. Rebooting fixed it. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2018, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/3 "2018-11-27T03:30:59Z")
Don’t know for sure if this is related to your issue, but a regular SMS is limited in length to 160 characters. A longer SMS might have been concatenated from multiple messages. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2018, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/4 "2018-11-27T09:34:20Z")
There is always more to learn: > [@](#): > > The maximum length of text message that you can send is 918 characters. However, if you send more than 160 characters then your message will be broken down in to chunks of 153 characters before being sent to the recipient’s handset. > > The good news is that the vast majority of handsets nowadays will join the multiple message parts together and present a single, extra-length message for the recipient to view. > > The bad news is that the networks will charge you for every chunk of 153 characters that you send! So a message of 420 characters will be sent and charged as three text messages. > > So it’s good financial discipline, as well as good SMS etiquette, to keep the message down to 160 characters. But it’s good to know that if you need to, you can send quite large text messages. > [Is there a maximum SMS message length? | TextAnywhere](https://www.textanywhere.net/faq/is-there-a-maximum-sms-message-length) ---
**Author:** ![GMANCANADA](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gmancanada/32/2837_2.png) [@GMANCANADA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GMANCANADA)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2018, 11:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/5 "2018-11-27T11:40:49Z")
@bob++ Wow, very good to know. Thanks. My related (just curious) question: Is this also true for iMessage and WhatsApp in iOS? Are they breaking down my texts into 153 character chunks of data and sending those and then reassembling? ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2018, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/6 "2018-11-27T12:09:21Z")
> [@GMANCANADA](#): > > @bob++ > Wow, very good to know. Thanks. > > My related (just curious) question: Is this also true for iMessage and WhatsApp in iOS? Are they breaking down my texts into 153 character chunks of data and sending those and then reassembling? No, because those are sent as data, like emails or web traffic etc, rather than via the cellphone SMS service. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2018, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/7 "2018-11-27T13:35:47Z")
Well, that’s a nice bit of info, but that’s not what’s up. I can get a short text like, “I snogg you” and the notification will say “6”. Further research shows an additional message will change the indicator to 7. So it’s like the phone just doesn’t realize there’s such a thing as 1,2 3,4,& 5. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2018, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-cell-phone-doing-this/825123/8 "2018-11-27T13:47:20Z")
Go here: [https://forums.androidcentral.com](https://forums.androidcentral.com) You’ll find a gaggle of experienced android users who have seen it all.