Sometimes, I’ll receive a phone call from somebody but I’m just not in the mood to talk. Or maybe I’m in the middle of something else and just can’t talk right now. Still, I might want to quickly acknowledge the fact that I received that person’s call, and that I’ll get in touch with them later. iOS has a feature made for these moments: It lets you respond to your unanswered phone calls with a text message instead.
It’s easy enough to use: When you receive a call you can’t (or don’t want to) answer, tap the Message button onscreen, then choose from one of three canned responses, or tap Custom… to type out your own.
If you don’t like any of the canned suggestions, you can easily change them to something else. Open the Settings app, tap Phone, then tap Respond with Text. Tap any of the three default responses, then enter your own. Once you’re done, press the Home button to return to the home screen. The next time you receive a call, you will be able to respond with a pre-formatted text response of your own creation.
