It’s the rare text message that we want to save for more than a few hours or a day or two. Most text messages are quick, disposable, and ready deletion not long after they’ve been read and replied to.
When it comes to deleting texts from your iPhone, you’ve got a couple of options. But when you delete them, make sure you mean it – there’s no getting texts back after you delete them.
The iPhone treats text messages as conversations, showing the messages you send and receive in word balloons. You can delete an entire conversation or just individual text messages within a conversation.
Delete an Entire Conversation
1. To delete an entire iPhone SMS conversation, tap the Messages app (it’s on your home screen, unless you re-arranged your icons).
2. If you were in a conversation when you last used the app, you’ll see it. Tap the arrow at top left to go to list of conversations. If you weren’t already in a conversation, you’ll see the list of all conversations.
3. Tap the “Edit” button at top right of the screen.
4. Tap the red circle at the left. This will introduce a “Delete” button at the right.
5. Tap the “Delete” button to delete that conversation.
Delete Individual Text Messages from iPhone
1. To delete individual messages from within a conversation, enter the conversation that has the messages you want to delete.
2. Within the conversation, tap the “Edit” button at top right.
3. Next to each message, a small, empty circle will appear.
4. To mark a message for deletion, tap the circle next to it. It will fill with a checkbox, indicating that it will be deleted.
5. Check all the messages you want to delete.
6. When you’re ready, tap the “Delete” button at the bottom left.
If you tapped “Edit” by mistake and don’t want to delete any texts, don’t tap any of the circles - just tap “Done” to exit.
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