In a world where WhatsApp and iMessage are everywhere, texting is second nature.
But it wasn’t always that way – 25 years ago the very first SMS text message was sent, marking the start of a new means of communication.
The world’s first SMS was sent by software architect Neil Papworth on December 3, 1992.
The message, simply reading “Merry Christmas”, was sent by computer because mobile phones didn’t have text capabilities at the time.
"I don't know if they really thought it was going to be a big thing," Papworth admitted to Sky News.
The messaging system boomed in popularity in the late 90s, when mobiles became more prevalent and were able to send and receive SMS.
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In 2012, 151 billion SMS messages were sent, though the arrival of instant messaging apps has led to a decline in the use of traditional texts.
WhatsApp announced this year that it has one billion daily active users, and that 55 billion messages are sent daily on its servers.
Texting has made an impact in other areas of communication – the 160 character limit of an SMS led to the use of so-called ‘txt spk’ abbreviations, and also inspired Twitter’s former arbitrary 140 character limit.
