Apple, iMessage sucks at audio messages — Here’s what needs to be improved
iMessage is my go-to messaging platform — I use it for everything, but there’s one part of it that drives me crazy and that’s audio messages. Here’s what needs to be improved for iMessage to rival WhatsApp and Messenger, and what I hope Apple changes with the next big iOS update.
For those unfamiliar with the feature, audio messages allow users to record themselves speaking and send the recording through iMessage, replacing typed text messages with a playback of a user’s voice. Here’s how to send audio messages on an iPhone or iPad.
What I hate about audio messages through iMessage
My biggest bugbear with audio messages in iMessage is the lack of any visible controls to rewind clips. Let me set the scene, you receive a 4-minute voice message, you are halfway through listening but you missed part of what was being said. As of now, when you miss part of an audio message or want to go back, you have to hold down on the voice note in the conversation thread and “peak and pop” to open the voice note in a new expanded view. By doing this you are taken right back to the very start of the voice note, leaving you to try and find where you left off. Because the rewind controls are so hidden away, many people don’t know they exist, leaving them with no other option but to start right from the beginning and relisten to the whole thing, right up to the point you missed.
When it comes to lengthy audio messages, this can be an absolute nightmare. In comparison, WhatsApp shows users an on-screen scrubbing bar when listening to a voice note that allows them to scrub backwards and forward to go back to listen again to anything that was missed in the conversation, similar to how users are able to scrub backwards and forwards through songs in the Music app.
Another instance where on-screen voice message scrubbing would be useful is when a user is listening to a voice note they received and suddenly their iPhone’s screen dims. As of now, when this happens the voice note stops and again, users need to start from the very beginning to get up to the point they were cut off. In all honesty, the Messages app should be configured in a way that the screen never dims when listening to a voice note but surprisingly it isn’t, so if you receive a long voice note you have to keep your finger on the display to prevent it locking automatically.
Right, enough about scrubbing. Let’s talk about sending a voice message. In a conversation, users touch and hold the voice message icon in the bottom right corner to begin recording. Unless you have been using iMessage for a long time, you are likely not to know that you can actually record hands-free by swiping left after holding down the audio message icon. This should be made much clearer, like how WhatsApp has a visible lock function for their hands-free recording.
Because the existing iMessage hands-free option is invisible and relies on users knowing exactly where and how far to swipe to enable it, all it takes is a wrong swipe and the message is gone, rendering the feature useless.
Just as I mentioned before about the screen dimming when listening to an audio message, I’ve been caught out before when even though I’ve had my finger held on the display while recording my message or had the hands-free lock enabled, the display has dimmed and my voice note has disappeared, meaning I had to start all over again and try and remember everything I had previously said.
How I’d like to see Apple improve audio messages through iMessage
Recent iOS updates make me feel like audio messages have been forgotten about. It’s time Apple gave this small but important iMessage feature some love, and here’s what I’d like to see added in the near future:
- A clear, visible lock icon for hands-free audio message recording
- An on-screen scrubbing bar to avoid having to relisten to a full voice note just to catch the bits that were missed
- Auto-locking disabled when either listening to or recording voice messages
- An icon/symbol to show when the person you are speaking with is recording/replying to a voice message
- Background listening, allowing for messages to continue to play when leaving the Messages app or the conversation thread
- The option to speed up voice messages by changing the playback speed to 1.5X, 2X, etc.
I’m curious to know what you think about audio messages in iMessage in its current state and how the feature could be improved moving forward. Send me a tweet, @TomSykes or follow The Apple Post (@TheApplePost) on Twitter.