Does imessage delete messages for everyone? Explained

Last Updated on March 5, 2022 by Kennedy

Ever found yourself in an embarrassing moment where you sent a message to a wrong person or probably sent a message which you regretted and wants to get rid of the in both your phone and the recipient phone?

I’ve have found myself in this type of situation especially wanting to take my sent text message.

But the question will be,

How possible can you delete a sent text message for everyone? For everyone means for you and the recipient as well. Hmmm quote impossible but let’s see in terms of iMessage.

Does imessage delete messages for everyone?

The answer is no. iMessage don’t delete for everyone because the feature to delete for everyone is not available on iMessage just like it is on whatsapp.

I’m sure you are very much disappointed by the answer above but that’s the reality unless Apple will feature delete for everyone on it’s iMessage. But as at this time of writing this post, you can’t delete for everyone on iMessage except for yourself.

Lets pray that apple will feature it on iMessage just like it is on whatsapp.

Now the next question will be what is the solution of getting rid of a sent text message on both my phone and the recipient phone as well.

What you need to do

If you happen to send a text message which you want to get rid of on the recipient phone as well, you only need to be fast about that.

What I’m talking about is that once you hit on the send button and realize that you made a mistake, immediately enable airplane mode on your phone or turn off Wi-Fi in case of sending an iMessage and this will prevent the message from being sent or delivered to the recipient.

However, the question is how fast will you be.

Messages especially iMessages are very fast in going through. If the recipient phone is on and active with an internet connection, immediately you tap on the send button within a second the recipient will receive the message.

Now if the recipient phone is switched off or has no active internet connection, then you are very lucky cause immediately you deleted the sent iMessage, the recipient won’t be able to receive the message especially if it’s cellphone is not active for a long while.

So this is the only solution to the question of the day, does imessage delete messages for everyone.

Once the recipient received the sent iMessage or text message, I’m sorry there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.

Sent a wrong message?

In case you made a mistake and sent a wrong text message and which has be delivered to the recipient, all you need to do is to apologize for the wrong message.

As it is not possible to delete a text message for everyone on iphone, you only need to apologize for the wrong text message if you care so much about it.

I’ve made a mistake sending a text message to a wrong person, what I did is to send another text to the recipient apologizing for the previous text message cause it wasn’t meant for him.

Definitely the person will understand.

As we can’t delete messages for everyone or take back a sent messages, one needs to be very careful when sending a text message. Look at the recipient to see if you are sending to a right person and cross-check the body of your message to see if that’s what you want to send before hitting on the send button.

Once you have hit on the send button and it states delivered, that’s the final.

What happens if you delete a conversation on iMessage?

If you delete a conversation iMessage, the recipient will still have the conversation on it’s iMessage and absolutely nothing will happen except for yours will no longer be available.

Again, if you you delete a conversation on iMessage, the recipient won’t be notified about it or know that you deleted a conversation you made with him or her. Once you tap on the delete button you are only deleting the conversation on your iPhone or iPad.

Can you restore or recover a deleted conversation on iMessage? 

Yes you recover you deleted iMessages from the iCloud and works perfectly fine, all you need to do is to make sure that you enabled back up to iCloud for your messages.

Now head over to the settings app, tap on your profile and select iCloud. Scroll down to messages and disable it by tapping on the button.

Immediately you tapped on the button, what you will see is disable and download messages, go ahead and tap on the disable and download messages. 

Now go back to your messages app and you will see that the deleted messages be it sms text messages or iMessages will appear again on your message app. Another method is to recover deleted messages from the iCloud but only if you have a backup.

However, I don’t recommend this option because you have to factory reset your iPhone or iPad. You can only do this if you are desperate in need of your text messages.

The second method

Having made up your mind, go to the settings app and scroll down to general, tap and open general.

Scroll all the way down to reset and open it. If you are running on ios 15, what you will see Transfer or Reset iphone.

On the next screen tap on the reset button.

Once you tapped on reset button, wait for everything to be completed. Now you have to start all over again to set up your iPhone, but immediately you reached Apps and data, tap on restore from iCloud backup.

Enter your password and apple ID, tap on your backup and follow the on screen instruction. Wait for the restore to be completed and move straight to your message app. Right there you will see all your deleted sms text messages and iMessages back on your message app.

When you delete messages on Iphone does it delete for the other person?

No it doesn’t delete for the other person but rather on your phone. Once you hit on the send button and the text message or iMessage get delivered to the recipient phone, you can’t delete the message right on your phone.

This goes to the question being asked on if at all does imessage delete messages for everyone. So far this is applicable on whatsapp messenger and I do hope that one day Apple will feature it on iMessage cause it is very essential and same time helpful.

How do you delete messages on iPhone so the other person cant see it?

If the sent message never say delivered, immediately enable airplane mode or turn off Wi-Fi on your iPhone and the recipient will not receive the message.

However, if the sent message says delivered, I’m sorry that’s the final and there’s nothing you can do about it. Once a recipient receives a sent message on it’s phone, you can’t delete the message from your iPhone just like how it is on whatsapp and which is called delete for everyone.

This is one major disadvantage of sms text message and iMessage. They lack option to delete a sent text message for everyone.

Conclusion

One of the disadvantage of text messaging is not being able to delete the message for everyone once the recipient has received the message. This is why I mostly make use of whatsapp instead of iMessage though iMessage is very nice especially when it comes to sending quality pictures.

Talking about does imessage delete messages for everyone, this is where WhatsApp beat iMessage hands down and has an advantage over iMessage and this is where i draw the conclusion on does imessage delete messages for everyone.