# How to receive SMS

{% hint style="warning" %}
Free phone numbers are limited for this feature. If you want to test receiving an SMS message, please buy a phone number first.
{% endhint %}

{% hint style="info" %}
For the phone number you have bought, the receiving SMS is disabled by default. If you want to receive SMS messages, you should go to the phone number configure page to enable Receiving SMS feature first. Click here to learn how to enable Receiving SMS feature.
{% endhint %}

Once you enabled the receiving SMS feature, our system will create a chat conversation automatically when a new incoming message is received by your phone number.  You can check all the incoming messages and reply to any message by your need. It's painless to use as you do SMS chats on your mobile phone.

### How to check your incoming message

1. Login to your eztalks account.
2. Go to SMS on the left side, and click "Chats”
3. If you have [set up SMS forwarding](https://eztalks.gitbook.io/help/products/phone-numbers/how-to-set-up-sms-forwarding), you can also receive every incoming message instantly on your mobile phone. Click [here](https://eztalks.gitbook.io/help/products/phone-numbers/how-to-set-up-sms-forwarding) to learn how to set up SMS forwarding.

You can also click [here](https://eztalks.gitbook.io/help/products/sms/how-to-send-two-way-sms) to learn how to send and receive SMS 1 to 1 via Chat.


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