Schedule a Text to Send Later With This iPhone Trick

CNET

10 hours ago

Apple announced at its Worldwide Developers Conference on June 9 that the next version of the iPhone's operating system will be called iOS 26, not iOS 19. The tech giant also announced that iOS 26 will bring a transparent glass design to your iPhone's icons, menus and more. But when Apple released iOS 18 in September 2024, that update brought a feature to Messages that lets you schedule messages to send later called, simply, Send Later.
The feature does what its name implies and lets you schedule a message to send later. So if you remember someone's birthday is coming up or your friend asks you to remind them of something later, you can schedule a message now so you don't forget.
Read more: Everything We Know About iOS 26 So Far
Here's how you can schedule messages to send minutes, hours or days later.
How to schedule a text
1. Open Messages.
2. Tap into the correct chat.
3. Tap the plus (+) sign next to the text box.
4. Tap Send Later -- you might have to tap More to see this option.
You can send reminders to people now so you don't forget later.
Apple/Screenshot by CNET
Your text box will now read Send Later, and a blue bar will appear over it showing when your message will be delivered. You can tap this bar to adjust the date and time.
You can only schedule a message up to two weeks in advance despite the date wheel showing months in the future. So if it's July, you can't schedule a message to send in December, unfortunately.
Once you've selected the date and time to send your message, tap the text box to pull your keyboard back up. Type your message and hit the send button.
After hitting send, your message will appear in the chat with a dotted outline and a message over it that shows when the message will be sent. There's also a button that says Edit.
Tapping Edit opens a dropdown menu with the options to Send Message, Edit Time and Delete Message. If you want to edit the content of the message, you have to long-press on the actual message and tap Edit like you would a message you already sent.
You can see what a message will look like when you schedule it to send later.
Apple/Screenshot by CNET
If you know a friend's birthday is in the next week or two, you can schedule a message now to send to them later so you don't forget on their big day.
For more on iOS 18, here's what you need to know about iOS 18.5 and iOS 18.4. You can also check out our iOS 18 cheat sheet and everything to know about iOS 26.