Nowadays, people change phones and numbers often for a variety of different reasons.
However, have you ever wondered what happens when you change your number and someone texts you?
There are a few different possibilities.
If you “parked” the number with a service provider, the number will remain active and the provider will send a text to the old number.
However, if you’ve switched numbers (i.e “carrier” it) then you will be able to receive the text to your new number.
If you choose not to take either of the above actions, then it’s likely that your service provider will eventually reprocess the number- in which case the new owner of the number will likely receive any future texts!
Will You Still Get Text Messages From An Existing Contact If You Change Your Phone Number?
Whether or not you will continue to receive texts sent to your old number is entirely dependent upon how you changed your number.
If you’ve parked a SIM card/phone number with your service provider, your number will continue to remain active.
Parking your number means that the number- as long as the company exists- can send and receive SMS/MMS messages or calls.
If you choose to “carrier” your SIM card/phone number, the messages that your previous contacts send will be automatically directed to your new number.
Therefore, whether or not you receive the new messages will depend upon your choice of how to use your existing SIM card.
It’s important to remember that each phone number is attached to a SIM card. When saving a contact, you can choose to save it either to your phone or directly into your SIM.
(Saving your contacts to your phone can make backing up a more simplified process.)
iPhone users’ contacts will be linked to their iCloud contacts, and these will remain accessible to them via their iCloud account.
Google has similar features and will also automatically backup contacts.
Changing numbers can be a confusing and overwhelming process at first.
However, many apps such as WhatsApp have a configured list that will notify your previous contacts that you have switched numbers.
This handy function will ensure that your beloved contacts will still be able to reach you even if you HAVE NOT parked or carriered your number!
Will I Lose My Old Texts When I Get A New Phone?
The best way to ensure you don’t lose your old texts is to back them up on your phone.
Even in the event that you lose the phone or it breaks down, you’ll still be able to recover them from the cloud.
iMessage often reminds users to backup chats so they are accessible in the unfortunate case of the user losing their phone.
iMessage will also give prompts to help users throughout the process if it is their first time backing up.
Messenger apps work differently on different Android phones. However, most follow the same basic setup.
You must first access your messenger’s settings, select “Chat History”, and then select “Back Up.”
This can work even if you don’t park or carry your number.
You only need to back up the texts to your iCloud (for iPhones) or to Google Cloud (for Android users).
If you lose your phone on contract and get a new one through your service provider, you can still easily access your past messages.
To access your past messages, you should be able to go to your device’s messenger and click “Backup Chats”. Android users can or go into chat settings and select the same option.
However, if you are worried about the effectiveness of these backups, you can always choose to screenshot your most important chats and save them to your cloud storage instead.
FAQ
Does WhatsApp backup Chats?
Yes it does- and you can even choose when you want your messages backed up!
For example, many users opt for them to be backed-up weekly during the night.
It’s important to note that WhatsApp backups will use your cellular data or internet connection, and will display the amount of data (in MB/GB) needed for the backup.
Does it cost money to backup Chats?
There are generally no additional charges across social media platforms to backup Chats.
The only cost that might be involved is any cellular data that is required to upload your message history to the Cloud.
Many messenger backups don’t even require data to back up your Chats, as they are ‘pre-saved’ on the cloud until you delete them!
Do you lose your contacts when changing numbers?
If you saved your contacts to your SIM card rather than your device, and now no longer have access to the SIM card, unfortunately you won’t be able to recover them.
You can prevent this by saving your contacts to your phone and then backing up your contacts to your cloud storage.
By saving contacts to your cloud storage, you can switch between phones and numbers with ease!
If you’ve already backed up your chats from your previous phone number, you will also have access to those saved contacts as well.
In Conclusion
So, what happens when you change your number and someone texts you?
As we’ve found out in this article, there’s three main ways this could play out:
- The text message will still arrive at your old number, if you’ve kept it and “parked” it.
- The text message will arrive at your new number, if you’ve chosen to “carrier” it.
- The text message may be received by someone else if you’ve neither “parked” or “carriered’ the number, as the number will most likely be recycled by the carrier and sold again.
Hopefully you’ve found this resource helpful in better managing your messages and contacts on your phone!