Picture send directly to email or SMS

With the mini 2 you can send an email or text directly to a persons phone, they do not need any Garmin apps. However unlike a Zoleo you have to initiate the first message to allow them to communicate back to you. With Zoleo you actually get a phone number. Now since I don’t have a mini 3, I don’t know if the apps are a requirement for receiving photos or voice messages. I’m sure someone else can answer that for you.

Voice and Photo do require the messaging app. It is sent to a phone number/SMS. Not email or an InReach address. Recipient gets a link to your map location, or your mapshare if desired, and a link to Messenger. Yes, it's a step you need to inform recipients they will need to do. You are free to email or send SMS messages as usual, but voice and images are handled differently. I tested this out 2 days ago with my Min 3 Plus. Unless you select a recipient's phone number, Voice or Photo doesn't show as an attachment. When they receive it you also will need to inform them it's a phone number they won't recognize. Seems like 201 is the area code that those messages arrive using. So, recipients need to be informed that they do not reply to the message as they normally would but the links within the message they receive. I view voice and photo as emergency related as I can send a voice message or reply to SOS with a voice or image. Or a family member who you have filled in with the protocol. 

Attached is a sample text message with a voice message I sent to myself. Shows the Text Transcription of the Voice Message and the links. I just sent a photo message to see what a text recipient w/o any app would see.

getting more than one other person to install an extra app on their phone JUST to receive pictures or video - but oh by the way if I send them text-only it will go to their email or SMS - is precisely what I am complaining about.

for them to get this special type of message from me they are inconvenienced.

not only this but they are not going to pay attention to this one-off app the way they do SMS or email or some other 3rd party messenger that they already use.

not every person on the planet is the techie super-invested-in-garmin-app user. it can be challenging enough already for people to be trained to use Signal instead of iMessage. now throw in ANOTHER app just to get messages from me...?!??

plain and simple - this type of reliance on a dedicated app is an inconvenience to the people I want to send pictures or voice to - and it will be potentially "missed" because of everything I just said.

@garmin needs to fix this. unlock the ability to send picture or voice to email and SMS - or even unlock it just for email.

As mentioned you don’t need any apps but you do need to reply to the link within the message and not the message directly as if a friend messaged you. Maybe Zoleo is a better option for you and they are considerably cheaper.

you are just distracting from the core issue by talking about how TEXT works.

i am well aware of how sending TEXT works. i have been using an inReach Mini since 2018.

i am specifically talking about the fact that i CANNOT send PICTURES or VOICE to someone who does not have the garmin messenger app. there is NO ability to send the pictures or voice directly to SMS or EMAIL.