History of Short Message Service (SMS)

Short Message Service (SMS) is a method of sending text messages to mobile phones. The history of SMS dates back to the early 1980s, when the idea of sending short text messages over the cellular network was first proposed.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, several telecommunications companies, including Nokia and Vodafone, began experimenting with SMS technology. In 1991, the first SMS message was sent over the Vodafone GSM network in the UK. The message, which simply read “Merry Christmas,” was sent from a computer to a mobile phone.

In the following years, SMS usage grew slowly but steadily, with the first SMS gateway coming online in 1993. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, SMS usage began to skyrocket, as more and more people started to own mobile phones and the cost of sending SMS messages dropped.

By the mid-2000s, SMS had become one of the most popular forms of communication, with billions of messages being sent every day. Today, SMS continues to be widely used, though it faces competition from other forms of text messaging, such as instant messaging and social media messaging.

In addition to text messaging, SMS is also used for various other services like two-factor authentication, appointment reminders, and marketing campaigns. SMS is considered as one of the most reliable and secure way of messaging.