How do credits work?

Here’s how message credits work:

1 credit = 1 sent SMS text (a plain text message with or without emojis) delivered in 1 segment (block of text).

3 credits = 1 sent MMS message (a message with any media, like a video, image, or GIF)

Messages broken up into more than 1 segment cost 1 additional credit per segment.

The total credits you are about to use before sending or scheduling messages is indicated at the bottom right of the message box (examples below).

What is a message segment?

SMS segments are the blocks of characters (letters, numbers, spaces, punctuation, etc) that an individual SMS message is broken into. Segments are usually 160 characters for the GSM-7 format and 70 characters for the UCS-2 format. GSM-7 is the standard format, but UCS-2 is almost always used if your message contains emojis.

Messages over the character limit will be sent in multiple segments.

These rules are set by wireless carriers, not TextSpot.

Examples of credit calculations:

One message to one person is 1 credit:


One message sent separately to two people is 2 credits:


One list message that contains 11 contacts will be sent individually to the 11 contacts in the list for 11 credits:


One list message that contains 11 contacts and contains an image will cost 33 credits:


Send a 2 segment SMS message to 1 contact and it will cost 2 credits.
Send a 1 segment SMS message to a list of 10 contacts and it will cost 10 credits.
Send a 1 segment MMS message to 1 contact and it will cost 3 credits.
Send a 1 segment MMS message to a list of 10 contacts and it will cost 30 credits.

To determine your total estimated credits used for any sent message, follow this simple equation:

Total Contacts x Total Segments x Message Type (MMS or SMS) = Total Credits Used

Updated on: 01/02/2023