MMS Messages
Media may appear differently for each person receiving a message, depending on their device. Carriers and devices may shrink or enlarge media to accommodate screen sizes. We recommend testing your video messages on a variety of test numbers to better understand how your texts will send!
Upload Media to Broadcast
- Once you navigate to Broadcasts from your Messaging home screen, and are in your broadcast (new or draft), find the Compose Message section. The first sub-section under Compose Message is MMS Media (Optional). This is where you will upload your media!
- To upload new media, click Upload Media. This will open a new window. We support uploading .jpeg, .png, .gif, and .mp4. To upload your file, click Choose File.
- After you choose your file, click upload.
- To use media you’ve previously uploaded, click Saved Media.
- This will open up a window of all of your previously used saved media. Here, select one of the images/videos/gifs and then Select.
- After you select your media, from either option, you will see it appear in your example message preview.
- If you decide you do not want to use that image, you can click the red x next to the name of your media under MMS Media (Optional).
Video Best Practices
What format/size should my video be?
Making sure your video is properly sized is important to the deliverability and success of your MMS messages.
Best Sizing and Format for Videos:
For best results, we recommend a video with a 480x480 (square) aspect ratio
- All content will be included in the image; however, for best results, avoid putting any critical content within 40 px of the edge of the frame.
- If you want a landscape or portrait format, we recommend the following aspect ratios:
480 x 640or480 x 720- Note - it’s possible this format of video gets cropped once sent
General Formatting + Sizing Tips:
- Best to keep aspect ratios consistent for all of your videos to save you time formatting videos for all of your future sends
- We recommend 30 FPS (frames per second) for videos, but anything divisible by 15 is the bare minimum requirement for best results
- Switchboard caps all MP4 uploads to 20MB
- All videos have something called “Content of Interest” — this is content within your media (like a face or name) that should be as centered as possible - just in case any part of your video gets cropped by carriers
How long should my video be?
We recommend the following duration depending on the content of the video/the type of number you are using:
- Local 10 Digit:
- 20 seconds or less for videos with music and fast motion
- 30 seconds or less for videos with more static images and limited sound
- Toll-Free:
- Messages must be 10 seconds or less to ensure successful delivery
