Can I forward iPhone text messages to another phone number?

Yes. PhoneLeash forwards your incoming iPhone texts to your email, and you can add one extra step in Apple Shortcuts that also relays each text to a second phone number as an SMS. The relayed text arrives silently, with the original sender's name, their number, and the message body.

Does the forwarded text arrive silently, or do I have to tap send each time?

It arrives silently — no tap required — as long as you turn off 'Show Compose Sheet' in the Send Message action and use a single message automation. If you stack multiple automation triggers on the same shortcut, iOS pops up a compose sheet for the duplicate runs, so for phone-to-phone forwarding stick to one automation.

Will the other person know the text was forwarded?

The relayed SMS is sent from your phone number, so whoever receives it sees it coming from you. If you forward to your own second phone, that is exactly what you want. If you forward to someone else, they will see your number as the sender, not the original sender's — the original sender's name and number appear inside the message text instead.

Does it cost anything to forward to a phone?

PhoneLeash itself is a subscription with a free trial. The relayed SMS goes out through your carrier's normal messaging, so it counts against your texting plan the same way any text you send does. On most modern US plans that is unlimited; on pay-per-message or international plans, each forwarded text may incur your carrier's standard SMS charge.

Can I forward to my email and a second phone at the same time?

Yes, and that is actually how it works. The forwarding shortcut sends each text to your email first, then to the second phone, so both destinations receive every message. Keeping email on is useful — it is an easy way to confirm forwarding is working. If you only care about the second phone, leave email on and add a filter in your inbox (for example a Gmail rule) that sends the forwarded emails straight to Trash.

Why did a one-word text or a bare link not get forwarded?

Apple's Shortcuts message automation has no true 'any message' wildcard, so the standard setup triggers on messages containing a space. Messages with no spaces at all — a single word like 'Ok', a lone emoji, or a bare URL — may not fire the trigger, so PhoneLeash never sees them. This is an Apple Shortcuts limitation, not a PhoneLeash one. The vast majority of real texts contain a space and forward normally.

Can I change the destination phone number later, or use a variable?

You pick the destination number once, inside the Send Message action in Shortcuts. Apple does not allow the Recipients field to be a variable — it must be a contact or number chosen when you edit the shortcut. To change it later, edit the shortcut and pick a different number. To forward to two phones, add a second Send Message action.

Does this work for iMessages (blue bubbles) too?

Yes. PhoneLeash on iPhone forwards iMessage (blue bubble), RCS, and SMS (green bubble) — texts from other iPhones, Android phones, businesses, banks, and verification codes all relay. Picture messages forward too: the text or caption comes through with a note that the attachment itself was not forwarded.

Do attachments get forwarded as well?

The attachment file itself — a photo, video, or other media — is not forwarded on iPhone; it stays on your phone. What you get is the message text plus an '[Attachment not forwarded]' note (in both the SMS and the email) so you know something was attached and can check the original phone. One iPhone-specific detail: PhoneLeash can flag the note when a message has a single attachment, but if a message arrives with more than one attachment, iOS does not give PhoneLeash enough to detect them, so the note may not appear on multi-attachment messages. PhoneLeash on Android does not have this limitation — it handles and forwards messages with multiple attachments.

How much does PhoneLeash cost on iPhone?

PhoneLeash starts with a free trial, no credit card. After the trial it is a subscription billed through your Apple ID, which you can cancel anytime in Settings → Apple ID → Subscriptions.

How to Forward iPhone Texts to Another Phone

You can forward incoming iPhone text messages to a second phone — automatically, and without lifting a finger each time — using PhoneLeash and Apple Shortcuts. Every text that arrives on your iPhone gets relayed as an SMS to the number you choose, complete with the original sender's name, their phone number, and the message body. It is the classic two-phone problem solved: messages that land on one phone show up on the other within seconds.

This guide covers when phone-to-phone forwarding is useful, exactly what the relayed text looks like, how to set it up in about three minutes, and the one setup detail that keeps it silent.

Why forward texts to another phone?

Forwarding to email is great for a searchable archive. But sometimes a phone is the right destination — you want the message to land in a Messages app, not an inbox. Common cases:

Two-phone life. A work iPhone and a personal phone, or a primary and a backup. Texts arrive on whichever phone you are not holding; forwarding puts them on the one you are.
Parents and a child's first phone. A parent can have texts from a child's iPhone relayed to their own number, so they see what is coming in without picking up the other phone.
Caregivers. Keeping an eye on an elderly relative's messages — appointment reminders, pharmacy notices, family check-ins — by having them mirrored to your phone.
Traveling with a second SIM. Your home-country iPhone stays on the nightstand; its texts (including verification codes) follow you to the phone you are actually carrying.
A shared or "household" number. Texts to a family-plan device relayed to the person who needs to act on them.

What the forwarded text looks like

No screenshots, no links to tap, no "you have a forwarded message" wrapper. Each relayed text arrives as a single, clean SMS that reads like this:

From your iPhone

to your second phone ▾

Jessica Morgan : +1 240 555 0199 | Your prescription is ready for pickup at the pharmacy.

That one line packs everything you need, in a format you can scan in a second:

Who it's from, by name — Jessica Morgan. The name is resolved from your iPhone's Contacts, looked up on-device (PhoneLeash never uploads or stores your contacts).
Their phone number — +1 240 555 0199 — right there if you want to call back or save the contact.
The full message — everything after the | is the text exactly as it arrived.

The pattern is simply name : number | message. If you granted PhoneLeash access to Contacts at setup, you get the sender's name; if you skipped that permission, the name is left out and you see just the number and message — no clutter, nothing broken:

From your iPhone

to your second phone ▾

+1 240 555 0199 | Your prescription is ready for pickup at the pharmacy.

Picture and media messages forward too. PhoneLeash can't put the photo or video file itself into an SMS, but it doesn't drop the message — the text comes through with a clear [Attachment not forwarded] note so you know something was attached and can check the original phone:

From your iPhone

to your second phone ▾

Jessica Morgan : +1 240 555 0199 | Here's the parking permit photo [Attachment not forwarded]

You never silently miss a message — you always get the sender, the text, and a heads-up that there was an attachment, by both SMS and email. (One iPhone quirk: the note appears for a message with a single attachment; iOS doesn't surface enough for PhoneLeash to flag messages carrying several attachments. PhoneLeash on Android handles multiple attachments without this limit.)

Because it is just a normal SMS, it lands in your Messages app alongside everything else — searchable, copyable, and instantly readable at a glance.

How it works

PhoneLeash forwards iPhone texts using Apple's Shortcuts framework — there is no background app polling your messages. When a text arrives, a small Shortcut runs, hands the message to PhoneLeash, and PhoneLeash formats and delivers it. Forwarding to a second phone adds one Apple action — Send Message — to the end of that same Shortcut:

A message automation fires the moment a text arrives.
The PhoneLeash Shortcut runs, sending the message to PhoneLeash, which formats it (sender name, number, body) and delivers it to your email.
The Send Message action sends that same formatted text on as an SMS to the second phone you picked — silently.

The whole round-trip takes a few seconds, and both your email and the second phone receive every text.

Setting it up

You need PhoneLeash installed and its standard email forwarding working first, because the phone-to-phone step adds onto the Shortcut that PhoneLeash already installs.

Step 1: Install PhoneLeash and finish the basic setup

Download PhoneLeash from the App Store, open it, and follow the setup — it installs the "PhoneLeash SMS action" Shortcut and the message automation for you, and tests delivery to your email. The full walkthrough, with screenshots and a 60-second video, is on the install page. Make sure ordinary email forwarding works before moving on.

Step 2: Add the Send Message action to the Shortcut

Open Apple's Shortcuts app.
Find "PhoneLeash SMS action" and tap to edit it (the ⋯ / edit option).
Below the existing Forward Message action, tap to add a new action and search for Send Message. Add it.
The Send Message action's Message field will auto-fill with the output of Forward Message — that is the formatted text. Leave it as is.

Step 3: Pick the destination number and make it silent

In the Send Message action, tap Recipients and enter the second phone number (or pick a contact).
Expand the action's options and turn Show Compose Sheet OFF. This is the setting that makes forwarding silent — without it, iOS pops up a "New Message" sheet for every text and waits for you to tap send.

That is the whole setup. Send your iPhone a test text from another phone (include a space in it — see the note below), and within a few seconds it should arrive on the second phone as an SMS.

Keep it to one automation

There is one rule that matters for silent phone-to-phone forwarding: use a single message automation.

If you add several automation triggers that all run the same Shortcut, iOS runs the Shortcut several times for the same incoming text. PhoneLeash de-duplicates so you do not get duplicate emails — but Apple's Send Message action, on those duplicate runs, pops up an empty compose sheet instead of sending silently. With one automation, there is exactly one run per text, and forwarding stays silent.

So for forwarding to a phone, stick with the single "When I get a message" automation that PhoneLeash sets up, and make sure it is set to Run Immediately (Shortcuts app → Automations tab → tap the PhoneLeash automation).

Good to know

A few honest limitations, so there are no surprises:

Whitespace-free messages may not forward. Apple's Shortcuts has no true "any message" wildcard, so the automation triggers on messages containing a space. A one-word reply ("Ok"), a lone emoji, or a bare link with no spaces may not fire the trigger. Nearly all real texts contain a space and forward fine.
The relayed SMS comes from your number. Whoever you forward to sees the text as coming from your phone. The original sender's name and number are inside the message text. If you forward to your own second phone, this is exactly right.
One destination, chosen in the editor. Apple does not allow the Recipients field to be a variable, so you pick the number once when editing the Shortcut. To forward to two phones, add a second Send Message action. To change the number, edit the Shortcut.
Carrier messaging applies. The forwarded SMS goes out through your carrier like any text you send. On unlimited plans that is free; on metered or international plans, standard SMS rates may apply.
The iPhone must be on and connected. Forwarding runs on the device, so the iPhone needs to be powered on and online for texts to relay.

You'll keep getting the emails too — and that's useful

The setup above forwards each text to your email and to the second phone. The email step does not turn off, and that is on purpose: it is the easiest way to confirm forwarding is actually working. If a text shows up in your inbox but not on the second phone, you know the problem is in the Send Message step, not in PhoneLeash — a handy built-in diagnostic. You also get a searchable backup of every text for free.

If you genuinely only want the second phone and the forwarded emails are clutter, don't fight it at the iPhone end — just filter them at your inbox. In Gmail, create a filter that matches these forwarded messages and choose Delete it (send to Trash); Outlook, iCloud, and most other providers have the same kind of rule. The forwarding keeps working, the diagnostic value stays, and the emails quietly land in Trash instead of your inbox.

New to PhoneLeash on iPhone? This overview explains what the iPhone version does and how it differs from Android, and How to forward iPhone texts to email covers the email side in depth.

Get started

Download PhoneLeash from the App Store, finish the quick setup, then add the Send Message step to forward your texts to a second phone. There is a free trial, so you can confirm it works end to end before subscribing. If anything is not forwarding, walk through the install page or email support@phone-leash.com and we will help.