How to fix Galaxy S9 text messaging app that converts long SMS to MMS on its own

Hello and welcome to today’s #GalaxyS9 troubleshooting article. This post tries to answer three texting issues that were reported to us, mainly about some S9 converting long texts into MMS. We include one typical case below. If you have the same or similar experience, make sure to follow our troubleshooting steps.

Problem #1: Facebook and Messenger on Galaxy S9 Plus keep updating on their own

My galaxy S9 Plus keeps updating Facebook & Messenger on it’s own. I have turned off auto-update on Google Play, Samsung App place, Facebook & in my app settings. Yet it is still updating every few days. I have discovered that I have a app called Facebook App Manager. I have force stopped this app & it still updates. Reading online I found where it says I need to disable the Facebook Installer App, but my phone does not have that app installed. I am at my wits end over Facebook & Messenger updating constantly & I have no control over it at all. And I have completely removed Facebook & Messenger, did a soft restart and the reinstalled both to have the same issues. Any help at this point is welcomed. Thank you in advance.

Solution: There should be at least five Facebook apps in your phone:

Facebook
Facebook app installer
Facebook app manager
Facebook services
Messenger

Instead of force stopping Facebook app installer, Facebook app manager, and Facebook services, consider disabling them instead and see what happens. We think only Facebook app installer is responsible for allowing updates on your app automatically but you can try the method of elimination to see which one of the three is really responsible.

Problem #2: Galaxy S9 Plus can’t view certain blog in Facebook app

Hi. I have suddenly been surprised by the inability to access the cartoon story by many of our Facebook viewers of this page: https://www.facebook.com/eenanderekijkopautisme linking to the post with the cartoon story linking to this page of the website: https://www.ikbenautist.nl/graphics/het-spectrum-begrijpen-introductie-door-adje/ When people with Samsungs S7+ and S9+ and Huawei link through to the page, it seems a matter of pot luck whether they will see the cartoons or only the website page header, and no images at all. For a period the images can be seen, then again for a period they have totally disappeared. It is unfortunately not something that can be reproduced at will. Even though it may have worked (in my case) at least 20 times, next you know it becomes impossible for a multitude of times. And then a couple of hours later it all works again. Which is awful, because the visitors of our site are not going to retry again and again for hours until it works. What may be happening here? I’d love to know. 🙁 Cheers.

Solution: We don’t think it’s a Facebook problem at all. We can’t reproduce the issue you’re saying here in our end. You should work with the blog’s owner so they can figure out the problem. The blog may not have enough bandwidth to allow a certain number of users to view its content. If you are the owner of this blog, try talking to the company that hosts it and see if there’s a way for you to improve the bandwidth assigned to it.

Problem #3: How to fix Galaxy S9 text messaging app that converts long SMS to MMS on its own

Messenger randomly started converting all multi texts to multimedia texts and they never go through anymore. It no longer breaks the message up into other segments. For example, I can no longer send 2 messages to someone at a time. It reaches the point of splitting the message and then converts it. It’s has never done this before.

Solution: There’s a number of possible reasons for the problem so try our suggestions below and see which one of them can fix it.

Wipe cache partition

System updates and app updates may sometimes corrupt the system cache that’s located in the cache partition. Although this type of cache is primary designed to help Android to load apps quickly, it can cause problems and bugs when it becomes corrupted. To ensure that the phone has a good system cache, make sure to wipe the cache partition first. Here’s how:

Turn off the device.
Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
When the Android logo displays, release all three keys.
An ‘Installing system update’ message will show for 30 – 60 seconds before the Android system recovery menu options appear.
Press the Volume down key several times to highlight wipe cache partition.
Press Power key to select.
Press the Volume down key to highlight yes, them and press the Power key to select.
When the wipe cache partition is complete, Reboot system now is highlighted.
Press the Power key to restart the device.

Install updates

Make sure that both Android and apps are up-to-date. If all your apps are taken from the Play Store, be sure to update all of them (if you change the default setting that allows the app to download and install updates automatically). Here’s how to do that:

Open Play Store app.
Tap More settings at the upper left (three-line icon).
At the very top where you see the photo for the selected Google account, tap on the profile photo of the account you want to use.
Once you’ve selected the profile you want, select My apps & games and update your apps.

If you have apps from other third party sources outside the Play Store, be sure that they are compatible with the operating system. Talk to their developers if you are not sure.

To manually check for Android updates, you can go under Settings > Software update.

Clear cache /data

Clearing an app’s cache or data may be necessary to fix this issue. Below are the steps to do that:

Open Settings app.
Tap Apps.
Tap on More settings at the upper right (three-dot icon).
Select Show system apps.
Find and tap your app.
Tap Storage.
Tap Clear Cache or Clear Data button.
Restart your S9 and check for the problem.

Reset app preferences

Resetting app preferences is oftentimes overlooked in many Android troubleshooting articles but when it comes to an issue like yours, it might help a lot. It’s possible that one or some of your default apps may not be set correctly, causing this glitch to occur. Because there’s no way to know if this guess is true, what you need to do is to simply ensure that all default apps are turned on. Here’s how to do that:

Open Settings app.
Tap Apps.
Tap on More settings at the upper right (three-dot icon).
Select Reset app preferences.
Restart your Note8 and check for the problem.

Factory reset

If the issue still remains at this point, consider reverting all software information on your phone back to their defaults. This can be useful especially if the app in question comes with the operating system such as the Samsung Messages app.

To factory reset your S9:

Create a backup of your data.
Turn off the device.
Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
Press the Volume down key several times to highlight ‘wipe data / factory reset’.
Press Power button to select.
Press the Volume down key until ‘Yes — delete all user data’ is highlighted.
Press Power button to select and start the master reset.
When the master reset is complete, ‘Reboot system now’ is highlighted.
Press the Power key to restart the device.

Use another text messaging app

As a workaround, you can also use another text messaging app. this may be helpful if the bug lies on the current messaging app you’re using. There are many text messaging app in the Play Store that you can try. We suggest that you start with Google’s own Android Messages.

Contact your carrier

Should all the solutions above fail, let your network operator know about the problem so they can help you troubleshoot it. Keep in mind that carriers may change how their services work from time to time. It’s possible that they may have put a limit on the length of the SMS that can be sent normally. This length varies by carrier that’s why you need to talk to them first hand, particularly since you did not have this issue before.