This iOS 17 feature has changed the way I use Messages forever— here’s how you can use it too

By John-Anthony Disotto
last updated

Swiping is easy.

iOS 17 swipe to reply iPhone 13 mini with frog
(Image credit: Future / Apple)
iOS 17:

A grid of iPhones running iOS 17

(Image credit: Apple)

- Compatibility: iPhone XR and later
- Release date: September 18
- How to download and install iOS 17
- How to make iOS 17 Contact Posters
- How to use StandBy on iOS 17
- How to leave a FaceTime video message on iOS 17

While big iOS changes are often colorful new user interfaces and landmark new features, sometimes it's the little things that make a big difference. That has never been truer of this tiny yet significant change to messages in iOS 17; swipe to reply. 

It's a feature that WhatsApp users have boasted about for years, and one that if you don't have WhatsApp, you'll wonder how you've ever survived without it. Apple has only ever offered the clunky long press option to reply to messages, bringing up an interface that also lets you copy messages, translate them, or react with an emoji. 

Swipe to reply is going to transform just how quickly you can reply to messages, especially in those all-important group chats. 

How to download and install iOS 17

How to swipe to reply in iOS 17 Messages

1. Swipe Right

(Image: © Future / Apple)

Open Messages and find a message you want to reply to within a conversation. Swipe right on the message, and you’ll notice a reply arrow pop up on the left. Let go when the arrow pops up

2. Reply

(Image: © Future / Apple)

This will create an isolated thread, so type your reply and hit send.

You can now swipe to reply to any future messages and keep a specific topic of conversation going within the created thread. It’s a great way to keep your group messages clutter-free.

One more thing… replying to iMessages is finally good

For years, WhatsApp has had a convenient method to quickly reply to a specific message by using a simple swiping gesture. Before iOS 17, the Messages app on iPhone would allow you to reply to a message in its own dedicated thread, but you’d have to press and hold onto a message in order to reply.

It was incredibly cumbersome, so much so that I never even bothered to use it despite loving the ability to reply to specific messages when chatting with friends on WhatsApp.

Now that Apple has finally added this simple gesture to iOS 17, I haven’t stopped using threads in Messages, and I’ve grown to love having streamlined group chats. Having the ability to swipe to reply in a conversation is also a joy, and as a long-time WhatsApp user, it feels so natural. 

At first, it took my brain a while to adjust to the prospect of properly replying to messages in the Messages app, but now I’ve got used to it, there’s no going back.

Small quality-of-life features such as swipe to reply, alongside the ability to create beautiful full-screen Contact Posters, have your own dedicated widget hub with StandBy, and much more, means that anyone using iOS 17 is likely to love the new features.

John-Anthony Disotto
John-Anthony Disotto
How To Editor

John-Anthony Disotto is the How To Editor of iMore, ensuring you can get the most from your Apple products and helping fix things when your technology isn’t behaving itself.

Living in Scotland, where he worked for Apple as a technician focused on iOS and iPhone repairs at the Genius Bar, John-Anthony has used the Apple ecosystem for over a decade and prides himself in his ability to complete his Apple Watch activity rings.

John-Anthony has previously worked in editorial for collectable TCG websites and graduated from The University of Strathclyde where he won the Scottish Student Journalism Award for Website of the Year as Editor-in-Chief of his university paper. He is also an avid film geek, having previously written film reviews and received the Edinburgh International Film Festival Student Critics award in 2019. 

John-Anthony also loves to tinker with other non-Apple technology and enjoys playing around with game emulation and Linux on his Steam Deck.

In his spare time, John-Anthony can be found watching any sport under the sun from football to darts, taking the term “Lego house” far too literally as he runs out of space to display any more plastic bricks, or chilling on the couch with his French Bulldog, Kermit. 

21 Comments Comment from the forums
  • graclarkey
    It’s taken Apple 3 years to introduce this missing “feature”, since it first introduced the ability to reply to a message — which was also years behind its instant messaging competitors.
    Does the Apple Messages/iMessage development team live inside an actual vacuum where it never tries out the competition!?
    Next up please: join forces with the Photos department to fix the clunky and longwinded way of sharing from the Photos app to the Messages app? Why on Earth can’t you pick from recent conversations, rather than having to manually type the person or people you want to share the photos with?
    And what about the even more cumbersome set of steps required to forward a message to another contact?
    Quick-swipe in Photos to select multiple, consecutive photos/videos from your camera roll at the same time … ? Why, after literally several years, has this not been been replicated in Messages? Has the Photos team patented it for themselves!?!
    Reply
  • Annie_M
    graclarkey said:
    It’s taken Apple 3 years to introduce this missing “feature”, since it first introduced the ability to reply to a message — which was also years behind its instant messaging competitors.
    Does the Apple Messages/iMessage development team live inside an actual vacuum where it never tries out the competition!?
    Next up please: join forces with the Photos department to fix the clunky and longwinded way of sharing from the Photos app to the Messages app? Why on Earth can’t you pick from recent conversations, rather than having to manually type the person or people you want to share the photos with?
    And what about the even more cumbersome set of steps required to forward a message to another contact?
    Quick-swipe in Photos to select multiple, consecutive photos/videos from your camera roll at the same time … ? Why, after literally several years, has this not been been replicated in Messages? Has the Photos team patented it for themselves!?!
    Your suggestions are really good, and thought provoking. You might want to submit them to Apple via their Messages Feedback page: https://www.apple.com/feedback/messages-ios-ipados.html
    Reply
  • Ledsteplin
    I find it easy to share photos in iMessage. Especially in iOS 17. Just long press the + left of the iMessage bar. The photos come right up. Tap the one you want. I never did start in photos to share in iMessage. Always done in Messages.
    Reply
  • graclarkey
    Ledsteplin said:
    I find it easy to share photos in iMessage. Especially in iOS 17. Just long press the + left of the iMessage bar. The photos come right up. Tap the one you want. I never did start in photos to share in iMessage. Always done in Messages.
    That’s great, and yes you can already share direct from the Messages app in iOS 16. But if you’ve got lots of photos that look similar, it’s not always easy to choose the ones you want to share based on the small thumbnail view of photos you are presented with in Messages.
    Reply
  • FFR
    graclarkey said:
    That’s great, and yes you can already share direct from the Messages app in iOS 16. But if you’ve got lots of photos that look similar, it’s not always easy to choose the ones you want to share based on the small thumbnail view of photos you are presented with in Messages.

    For multiple photos I prefer selecting them in photos and then dragging them to iMessage. It’s quite fast
    Reply
  • Ledsteplin
    FFR said:
    For multiple photos I prefer selecting them in photos and then dragging them to iMessage. It’s quite fast

    How do you "drag" photos from Camera roll to messages on iPhone? Do you refer to using the share sheet?
    Reply
  • FFR
    Ledsteplin said:
    How do you "drag" photos from Camera roll to messages on iPhone? Do you refer to using the share sheet?

    Nope. Drag and drop

    You select an image with your finger and hold until it minimizes, then select any other pictures from your photo library while holding the first pic, and when your done either swipe across the bottom to go back to iMessage or swipe up into the home screen to select the messages app, and drop it into the message you want to send
    Reply
  • Ledsteplin
    FFR said:
    Nope. Drag and drop

    You select an image with your finger and hold until it minimizes, then select any other pictures from your photo library while holding the first pic, and when your done either swipe across the bottom to go back to iMessage or swipe up into the home screen to select the messages app, and drop it into the message you want to send

    This doesn’t work. Not on iPhone.
    Reply
  • Ledsteplin
    graclarkey said:
    That’s great, and yes you can already share direct from the Messages app in iOS 16. But if you’ve got lots of photos that look similar, it’s not always easy to choose the ones you want to share based on the small thumbnail view of photos you are presented with in Messages.

    Small thumbnails? They look plenty big. This is after I long press the +. Then I simply tap the ones I want to share.
    Reply
  • FFR
    In the photos app, it’s easier if you use two separate fingers.
    Reply