Samsung Galaxy S5 Guide

How to turn on (or off) SMS and MMS message preview on Galaxy S5?

You can preview SMS (and MMS) messages in Galaxy S5 lock screen and notification area.

In most of the regions, SMS message preview is the default setting. In other words, it should work out of box.

But for some reasons, some Galaxy S5 owners find they cannot preview SMS messages (MMS as well) in the lock screen or in notification area. So you may want to turn this feature on.

In the other hand, some Galaxy S5 owners may not want to use this feature for some privacy reasons. So, you may want to know how to turn this message preview feature off.

In this GalaxyS5 how-to guide, I will show you how to turn on or turn off SMS message preview in your Galaxy S5.

How to turn on SMS and MMS message preview on Galaxy S5?

You can check the settings in the Messages app.

Start the Messages app, tap the menu button (3 vertical dots),  then tap Settings, as shown below.

galaxy_s5_message_preview_settingsgalaxy_s5_message_preview_notification

In the messages settings page, scroll down to find Notifications. Tap notifications as shown above. You can then setup the notifications for your messages (SMS and MMS), including message preview.

If you want to preview messages on lock screen, you can check lock screen.

If you want to show message preview in notification area, check status bar.

galaxy_s5_message_preview_lock_+screen_status_bar

How to turn on SMS and MMS message preview on Galaxy S5?

To turn off message preview, simply uncheck lock screen and/or status bar.

Other message notification settings in Galaxy S5

As shown above, in addition to message preview, you can customize message notifications in several aspects:

  • Set the notification tone. You can even customize notification tone for individual contact.  Please read this guide for further customization: How to customize Galaxy S5 ringtones and notification tones?
  • Turn on or turn off vibrate when you receiving SMS/MMS messages.
  • Repeat message alert.
  • Display new messages as pop-ups.

Please note, this guide is assuming that you are using Samsung Messages app. If you set Google Hangouts or other third-party messaging app as the default messaging app, these settings will not work.

Do you have any questions on turn on (or off) SMS and MMS message preview on Galaxy S5?

If you still have questions or encounter any problems when customizing Galaxy S5 message preview, please let us know in the comment box below.

More how-to guides , tips and tricks for using Samsung Galaxy S5 are available at Samsung Galaxy S5 how-to guides page.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Romano says

    Hi Team, I cannot find settings to activate a notification when my sms has been received/read on the other phone. Galaxy S5. thx a lot for your help !

    Reply

  2. Gwendalynn says

    This isnt what im looking for im tired of my texts sending as MMS’S my friends are having tk download my text messages and i have to download them if they are a certain size how do i change this…..

    Reply

  3. Peyton Leger says

    Is there any way I can get the notification to not pop up at all. Like on the iPhone I can turn off my notification to where when I receive a text my iphone would just vibrate and my lock screen wouldn’t light up. On the s5, all of it shows in my lock screen and I want it gone all together. Can I do this? I know on s4 you can but I can’t seem to find it on my s5. Please help. This is super annoying.

    Reply

  4. Amy says

    I’m having an issue where on my samsung s5 the two messaging apps are both sending notifications in my status bar. Can’t figure out how to turn one of them off. If possible I wanna turn the regular messaging off and use my message+. Thanks

    Reply

  6. Justin says

    My messaging pop up is not working. It shows it is selected in the setting under notifications but today it just stopped working. Is there any reason why. I tried powering off the phone and turning it back on and I tried turning all notifications off and then back on again but still the pop up window is not showing up. Any suggestions???

    Reply

  7. Duana Yarbor says

    How do I turn off repeat notification. I obviously turned it on, and now can’t remember how I did it. lol Help!

    Reply

  8. mjm413 says

    How can I get my screen to light up when I receive a text message? I need to have my phone silent while at work and the notification light does not catch my eye but a screen light-up would.

    Reply

  9. sam says

    Is there a way to not see my messages in my call log when looking up a specific person. It breaks down all communication right from there even when I put to display “only calls” from the menu. I find that really annoying.

    Reply

  11. veundja says

    Hi. When I receive message it comes on the screen and anybody can read it. There is no privacy to my messages. Please help me.

    Reply

  12. Tiffany says

    Whenever I send or receive a text, it shows up twice. It didn’t use to do this, it just started. I haven’t changed any settings or anything, please help!

    Reply

  14. O says

    On the pop us from the stock s5 messenger, is there a way too scroll through them? I tend to have more than one text at a time and it only shows the most recent text.

    Reply

  16. Kerry says

    When you have your messages set to Preview message – Lock Screen is there anyway you can just show the name of the person the message from and not show a preview of the actual message? I dont like turning it off as then it just says New message New message. Cant it say the persons name and New message?

    Reply

  17. karla says

    i don’t want to see the preview of the text message only the name of the person who text me. can you do it with the galaxy S5? and how do you it?
    i have tried so many ways and show me “NEW MESSAGE” I want to be able to see the NAME of the person who text me NOT the preview of the message. please help me

    Reply

  19. Garrett says

    Is there anyway to keep the s5 from lighting up whenever you get a text. It’s extremely annoying I’m sorry if I missed in the comments. I’m using the app called messages I think it’s the Samsung one that comes with it. It has a opened envelope for the icon.

    Reply

  21. Iridian says

    Why do my messages keep breaking up into smaller pieces when ever I receive a long message? Can I stop it from doing so?

    Reply

  22. Elena says

    Hi guys, so on my S5, the MMS messages i receive alway come separately as a group message. It’s annoying, I want it to all come into one connected conversation with that person, can i change that and how? thanks

    Reply

  25. kirsten says

    Im not sure if any of thid gets back to developers but .. Can the there be an update allowing users to see just a pop up of the sender without the message? This seems really obvious to me. This is really important for users who need to for instance maintain some level of confidentiality…

    Reply

  27. Shenn Rockwell says

    Whenver i open a message there is a pop up that has 2 buttons : “Accept” and “I do not accept this”
    It shows everytime i open a new message and its very irritating because i cannot reply right away to mssgs
    Please help

    Reply

  28. Scott says

    Just one question my phone used to just show me a new txt message in a small envelop style on the lock screen… Now it’s a big colored box a long with new txt message is there any way to change it back to the small way?

    Reply

  30. T says

    My phone just updated and now I cannot see my messages in preview in either lock or unlock screen. Followed all the prompts above but I don’t even have a Lock Screen bar or Status bar in my Notifications menu under the Settings menu in messenger. My messaging background is also white and I tried changing that to black (how it was before) and saved it and even restarted my phone and it’s still white. What gives with the update?!

    Reply

  31. Christine says

    After a recent update from Samsung, the preview text message on locked screen doesnt work. The preview box is check under settings and was working before the update. help

    Reply

  32. anon says

    how do i turn messages back on to public, i turned it to private (so it only comes up as ‘new message’ instead of the persons name ive recieved it from) but now i cant remember how to turn it back to public so i can see who has sent me that message! ahh!

    Reply

  34. James says

    I keep getting a notification that pops up saying “You are already using a joyn client. To avoid conflicts, you need to open settings and disable it.” And it has a button that says settings and when you click on it does nothing.I’ve tried look it up and found nothing. I don’t know what else to do. It started right after the new Galaxy S5 update on either July 4th or 5th 2015. Please Help!!!!!

    Reply

  35. Brandy says

    I currently use just regular messaging on my galaxy s5 and when I switch to message plus I get a bunch of old text messages from like last month. How do i stop that??

    Reply

  36. Peter says

    I have Samsung Galaxy 5S and recently when I get a message I no longer get notification on the message icon…I use to be able to see how many messages I got on the message icon (envelop with yellow message sheet)…how do I get that back….also I have the same problem with getting a phone call when I don’t answer…….the green box w/phone in it use to have the number of calls I received that I have not answered…again how do I get that back

    Reply

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