How do you guys text your family in the Philippines that's low cost?

[A and T 82]

If you have an iphone look for an app called "textnow" plus they have a few others, that will give you a free phone #, and you can text international for free, and your friends overseas will text the # the program gives you.

Also you can use yahoo Im on your cell, skype, or Ebuddy

all of these are the free options

[philels 0]

hi i use to use loadntxt. it only cost the people in the philippines 1 peso per text and just 5 cents for u. just go to loadntxt.com. it's like preloading ur phone. i believe the minimum prepaid purchase u could do is $10. at least that's what i get. hope this helps!

[Kevin-n-Merlaine 14]

I had my wife roam her Smart sim before she left...incoming texts are free and you can receive them even with NO load. If you have an iphone, get an app called BiteSMS. You can prepay for text messages and they're cheap I receive texts on the Phils phone free (1 peso to her family) and send them on my ATT phone for about .06 cents each.

[Paps IR5 6]

You're welcome!

and it's Kezia here. David registered here, and made the first posts, but he rarely gets time to use this forum anymore so I took over and is now making most of the posts, although he does check here from time to time. This is also a good support group, to keep me from going mad from all the waiting and all the other troubles at USCIS.

None of the answer providing cheap route to text your family the Philippines and cheap for them to text you back.

Ever heard of SPIDERTEXT.COM? http://www.spidertext.com

I am no affiliates with this company but I have and still using their service. It is only 0.05c send and received to the Philippines. The nice thing about spidertext your family only pays P1 peso to reply to you. Goodluck and save save save!

I am just trying to help you guys finding the cheaper text. Specially Old School parents, or those who have no internet!

You sign up, buy the load and first time buyer there is an activation fee. I do not know how much now but it is only a time fee.

i HAVE USED THEM FOR OVER 10 YEARS NOW. I CAN NOT FIND ANY COMPANY CHEAPER THAN SPIDERTEXT.COM CAN OFFER!

They have four options.

1. SPIDER LOAD 100 Text Messages Send/Receive Between US And Philippines =ONLY COST $5

Number of message Send / Receive = $5 / $0.05 = 100 msgs

2. SPIDER LOAD 200 Text Messages Send/Receive Between US And Philippines =ONLY COST $10

Number of message Send / Receive = $10 / $0.05 = 200 msgs

3. SPIDER LOAD 400 Text Messages Send/Receive Between US And Philippines =ONLY COST $20

Number of message Send / Receive = $20 / $0.05 = 400 msgs

4. SPIDER LOAD 600 Text Messages Send/Receive Between US And Philippines =ONLY COST $30

Number of message Send / Receive = $30 / $0.05 = 600 msgs

5. SPIDER LOAD 800 Text Messages Send/Receive Between US And Philippines =ONLY COST $40

Number of message Send / Receive = $40 / $0.05 = 800 msgs

[pidr029 0]

skype sms. 0.06 cents per sms. and if u have a roaming number where thye can rply,its cheaper for them.

if u guys have both iOS devices, have them register to a data plan and u can use imessages unlimted.

or the great chikka.com

[typo808 11]

I have a SMART ofw SIM card. When my honey texts me phils to US (she has SMART), it's 1php. I use afreesms.com to text US to philis. It's free to any carrier in phillipines. The only drawback is the limited ability to send 2 texts every 2 minutes and a limit of 160 characters.

But just like the cgifederal web site, they track your IP. so I just use a different ISP (my phone and my home Internet) to increase the limit. Same way I could check back into cgifederal as often as I want. If I get locked out due to the "too many visits", I just switch ISPs. Simple.

Edited October 4, 2013 by typo808

[Travelpro 3]

Its not texting and its not the cheapest but I bought my fiance a Pocket WiFi through Globe. I pay about $22 a month for that with unlimited data. But she can email from her phone anytime and do the same plus skype on from Tablet anytime.