Other forms: text messages
A text message is a note you type into your phone and send electronically to your friend. If you don't have time to call your grandma on her birthday, at least send her a text message!
The 19th-century telegraph system, which allowed people to communicate electronically across long distances, is the ancestor of modern text messages. The method of sending short notes composed of letters and numbers from one mobile phone to another began in the early 1990s. It didn't gain widespread popularity until around 2002, when more than 250 billion texts were sent. The text in today's text messages includes not just words, numbers, and punctuation, but also emoji, gifs, and other fun extras.