Apple released the first public beta of iOS 18 on Monday, just over a month after the tech giant announced the software at its Worldwide Developers Conference in June. Apple said the update will bring a host of new features to your iPhone, including RCS messaging and more ways to customize your Home screen. But one new feature — which can help you send notes like birthday texts in advance — is scheduling text messages to send later.
Learn more: Everything you need to know about the iOS 18 public beta
We recommend that you only download a beta on a device other than your primary device. Since this is not the final version of iOS 18, the update may have bugs and battery life may be short, so it’s best to keep these issues on a secondary device.
Note that the beta is not the final version of iOS 18, so more features may be available on your iPhone when iOS 18 is released. Apple has said that iOS 18 will be available to the public this fall, but there is no firm date yet.
Here’s how you can schedule messages to be sent a few minutes, hours, or days later.
How to schedule messages to send later
1. Open messages.
2. Go to the appropriate chat.
3. Press the plus sign (+) next to the text box.
4. Faucet Send later — you may need to press More to see this option.
You can send reminders to people now so you don’t forget them later.
Your text box will now read Send later, and a blue bar will appear on it, indicating when your message will be delivered. You can tap this bar to set the date and time.
However, you can only schedule a message up to two weeks in advance, even if the date wheel shows months in advance. For example, if it’s July and you try to schedule a message to send in December, the date wheel will automatically revert to two weeks from your current date. This could be a bug in the iOS 18 beta and may be fixed in the future.
Once you have selected the date and time to send your message, tap the text box to bring up your keyboard. Type your message and tap the send button.
What a message looks like when you schedule it to send later.
After you hit send, your message will appear in the chat with a dotted outline and a message on it indicating when the message will be sent. There is also a button that says To modify.
Tapping To modify opens a drop-down menu with options for Send the message, Modification time And Delete Message. However, if you want to edit the content of the message, you need to long-press on the actual message and tap To modify as you would with a message you have already sent.
If you know a friend’s birthday is in the next week or two, you can schedule a message now to send later so you don’t forget on the big day.
Keep in mind that iOS 18 is still in beta, so these features may be buggy or not work properly. There will likely be more betas before the operating system is released to the public, giving Apple plenty of time to work out any issues. As of now, it’s unclear when Apple will release iOS 18.
To learn more about iOS 18, here’s my hands-on experience with it the first public betawhat you need to know about RCS Messaging and how to customize your home screen.
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