What Are SMS Segments?

When you send a text message, mobile carriers break it into segments — small data chunks used to calculate billing and delivery.

Each segment equals 160 characters if you use standard GSM characters (letters, numbers, and common symbols).
If your message includes special characters, emojis, or non-Latin alphabets (like accents or non-English scripts), the message uses Unicode, which reduces each segment to 70 characters.

Message type	Characters	Sedgments used	Explanation
“Hi, welcome to Local5x!”	23	1	Short GSM message
“Hi 👋 welcome to Local5x!”	24	1	Unicode emoji reduces segment size
“Your verification code is 123456. It expires in 10 minutes.”	63	1	Still under 160 GSM characters
“Thanks for joining our rewards program! You’ve earned a $5 coupon to use this week.”	91	1	Over 160 GSM characters, so split into 2 segments

💡 Why It Matters

SMS pricing is based on segments, not messages.

A single message that’s longer than the character limit automatically becomes multiple segments, even though it looks like one text to the recipient.

So if your plan charges $0.02 per segment, a 2-segment message costs $0.04.

🧭 Tip

To optimize costs:

Keep messages short and clear.
Avoid unnecessary emojis or special symbols.
Use link shorteners when sharing URLs.