How Do I Text to a Phone with Pidgin?

Pidgin is an open-source instant messaging client that is capable of sending and receiving messages from multiple messenger clients. Pidgin can also be used to send SMS messages to telephones in countries with a country code of “1.” Sending an SMS message through Pidgin is just like sending an instant message to a buddy: you need to add the number to your buddy list before you send the phone a message.

Things You'll Need

• Pidgin IM client

Instructions

1. Open the “Add New Buddy” dialog by selecting “Add Buddy” from the “Buddies” menu.

2. Enter the phone number into the “Buddy’s Username” box. The number needs to be formatted properly. Type “+1” followed by the phone number; do not include parenthesis, dashes or other symbols in the number.

3. Add an alias and select a group for the phone number. Click “Add” to add the buddy to your Buddy List.

4. Open a chat window for the phone number. Type a message and click “Send” to send a text to the phone. Any replies to your message will appear in the chat dialog.

Tips & Warnings

• After sending a message, you may receive an “Auto-reply” message from the phone; the message can be ignored.

References

• Pidgin: Protocol Specific Questions