Send from more than one phone

QuickText is not limited to one phone. Pair as many as you like, then either choose which one your messages go through — switching takes a click — or let one campaign rotate across several phones automatically.

Capacity is the usual reason to add more phones. A single SIM can only send so much in a day before the carrier starts slowing it down, and spreading the same list across several numbers keeps every one of them at an easy pace.

Add another phone #

1. Install KDE Connect on it. The same free KDE Connect app your first phone uses. Open it once after installing.
2. Put it on the same wi-fi as your PC. Not mobile data, and not a guest network. The phone then appears in the list by itself, usually within a few seconds. If it does not, click Refresh.
3. Click Pair next to it. Check that the code shown on the phone matches the one on your PC, then tap Accept on the phone.
4. Allow SMS on that phone. Android asks each phone separately, so the permission you granted on the first phone does nothing for the second one. Details here: Allow SMS on your phone.

You pair a phone once. It stays in the list afterwards, and QuickText reconnects to it by itself whenever it is back on your network.

Pick the phone that sends #

Click Use this phone in its row. The In use badge moves over, and QuickText confirms with “Done. Your messages will be sent through …”. Nothing needs pairing again.

From version 1.4.0 there is a shortcut: the Compose page’s Send from card has the same choice as a little dropdown (with each phone’s connection dot), so you can switch the sending phone without leaving the page you are composing on. Picking a phone there is exactly the same switch.

The card at the top of the page always names the phone that is in use, so it appears twice on screen: once as the headline and once in the list below, where the switching happens.

The choice is remembered, so it survives closing the app. If no phone has been chosen yet, QuickText picks a connected one for you and tells you which.

Rotate one campaign across several phones #

From version 1.4.0, a campaign does not have to pick a single phone at all. Once a second phone is paired, the Compose page grows a Send from card: keep everything on one phone, or rotate across the phones you tick. The first message goes out through the first ticked phone, the second through the next one, and so on, round-robin.

• The split is automatic and even. 200 people across 10 phones is 20 messages per phone. Nobody maps messages to phones by hand.
• Your pace applies to the whole run. Whatever delay or time window you set on the Compose page paces the campaign as one; each phone sends at a fraction of that pace, which is exactly what keeps carriers relaxed.
• A phone that drops off is parked, not fatal. If one phone stops answering mid-run, the others take over its share and every person still gets their message. The finished view names the parked phone and shows how many each phone handled.
• History remembers which phone sent what. Every entry on the History page carries the phone it went out through.

Right before a rotation send, QuickText checks every ticked phone and, if some are offline, offers to go ahead with just the connected ones. Skipped people (block list, missing number) do not use up a phone’s turn, so the split stays even.

What the chosen phone decides #

The rotation above covers the Compose page’s campaigns. Everything else QuickText sends goes out through the phone that is in use at that moment:

• every message on the Compose page,
• the test message on the Your phone page,
• Import from phone on the Contacts page, which reads the address book of that phone.

Incoming replies are the exception. QuickText picks them up from every connected phone and matches them against the people you texted, so a reply to a message sent from your second phone still lands on the Messages page while the first phone is the one in use.

When the chosen phone is offline #

QuickText never switches phones behind your back. It offers the switch and waits for you.

• On the Your phone page it names the phone that is offline, names the other one that is ready, and points you at Use this phone.
• On the Compose page, if another paired phone is connected, the warning carries a one-click Switch to … instead (it is connected right now) link.

A phone that stays unreachable is a connection problem rather than a choice of phone: Phone will not connect.

Test a phone you just added #

Send a test in a phone’s row only checks the connection to that phone. It does not send a text. The real proof is the Send yourself a test message card further down the page, and that card uses the phone that is in use. So click Use this phone on the new phone first, then send yourself the test.