PhoneLeash vs SMS Forwarder by GawkAr (2026)
This guide compares two of the most popular SMS forwarding apps available on Android — PhoneLeash* and SMS Forwarder by GawkAr.
For most people who want to forward texts to email and reply from their inbox, PhoneLeash is the better choice — it sets up in minutes, forwards RCS messages, and keeps your texts private. SMS Forwarder by GawkAr is the better pick only if you specifically need to forward to Telegram, webhooks, or VKontakte.
PhoneLeash has been forwarding messages since 2011 and has over 500,000 installs (Google Play package com.gearandroid.phoneleashfree; also on the iPhone App Store). One long-time user captures its main edge over apps that quietly stop working:
"I used it for approximately 5 years and it worked really well. It just works seamlessly in the background." — PhoneLeash user, Google Play
While this blog is published by PhoneLeash, everything here about GawkAr's app is factual — drawn from its Google Play listing and the developer's own website and support documentation.
*PhoneLeash is also available for iPhone.Quick verdict
- Choose PhoneLeash if you want simple setup, the fewest app permissions, the ability to reply to texts from your inbox or a second phone, RCS forwarding, stronger privacy, and a longer full-feature trial.
- Choose SMS Forwarder by GawkAr if you need to forward to Telegram, a webhook/URL, or VKontakte, want to relay any app notification, or want a permanent free tier that forwards everything to one destination.
At a glance
| Feature | PhoneLeash | SMS Forwarder (GawkAr) | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Setup | Install, enter destination, done | ✅ | Register account, confirm email, configure | ❌ |
| Reply to forwarded texts | Yes — from email or a 2nd phone | ✅ | No (one-way only) | ❌ |
| Forward RCS messages | Yes | ✅ | No — per their own docs | ❌ |
| WhatsApp forwarding | Yes — purpose-built support | ✅ | Only as a generic notification relay | ❌ |
| Sender names | Live, on-device contact lookup | ✅ | Requires uploading/syncing your contacts | ❌ |
| Permissions requested | 3 (SMS receive, SMS send, notification access) | ✅ | Contacts, SMS, phone, notification access, account | ❌ |
| Message retention | Not stored (overwritten each message) | ✅ | SMS stored on their server up to 3 days | ❌ |
| Telegram / webhook / VKontakte | No | ❌ | Yes | ✅ |
| Free trial | 30 days, full features | ✅ | 7 days, full features | ❌ |
| Platforms | iPhone and Android | ✅ | Android only | ❌ |
| On the Play Store since | 2011 (15 years) | ✅ | 2018 (8 years) | ❌ |
| Company | US-based | Armenia-based company, Russia-based developer |
The biggest difference: replying to your texts
This is the line that separates PhoneLeash from nearly every other forwarding app, GawkAr's included. SMS Forwarder is one-way. It delivers your incoming messages somewhere — email, Telegram, another number — but to answer one, you have to pick up the original phone.
PhoneLeash is two-way, and it works for both forwarding modes. Forward to email and reply to the email — PhoneLeash sends the SMS from your phone, in your name, and the whole back-and-forth stays in one thread. Forward to a second phone and you can reply from there too. For anyone using forwarding to actually handle messages from a laptop or a work device — not just see them — this is the feature that matters most.
RCS: PhoneLeash forwards it, GawkAr can't
This gap is growing, because RCS is steadily replacing traditional SMS on Android. GawkAr's own support documentation is candid about it: RCS chats "aren't registered as SMS messages by the Android OS, so our app can't access them," and the page advises users to either disable RCS or "accept that these messages won't be forwarded."
PhoneLeash forwards RCS messages using notification access, so the modern texts your contacts actually send still reach your inbox. If your friends and colleagues are on RCS — and on Android, more of them are every month — this is the difference between catching your messages and silently missing them. (You can read GawkAr's own explanation on their RCS support page.)
Setup in minutes, not an afternoon
This is where most people feel the difference first. GawkAr's app asks you to register an account, confirm your email, log in, grant a broad set of permissions including contacts and phone access, and then make decisions about which server to route through and which features are behind the paywall before forwarding behaves the way you expected. Powerful, but a lot to figure out.
PhoneLeash is deliberately the opposite. There's no account to create and no email to confirm — you install it, enter the destination (an email address or another phone number), and forwarding starts. It requests just three permissions: receive SMS, send SMS (so replies work), and notification access (to catch RCS and WhatsApp). Contact access is optional. That's the whole setup.
GawkAr's developer doesn't dispute this. Replying to a user on Google Play who found the app hard to set up, they wrote:
"the app is not trivial and is indeed complex." — GawkAr, responding to a review on Google Play
If you've spent more time than you wanted configuring a forwarding app, that alone is a reason to try the alternative.
Your privacy: where your texts actually go
Both apps move your messages through a backend to deliver them — that's how forwarding works. The meaningful differences are in what gets kept and where:
| Privacy | PhoneLeash | SMS Forwarder (GawkAr) |
|---|---|---|
| Message retention | Not stored — last message overwritten each time, for duplicate detection only | SMS routed through their server stored up to 3 days |
| Your contacts | Read on-device only; your contact list never leaves your phone | Contact list synced to their server to resolve names |
| Data sharing | No data resale | Shares performance data with third parties for analytics and personalization |
| Company | US-based | Armenia-based company, Russia-based developer |
| Anti-misuse | Persistent status-bar notification, plus a one-time email to the phone owner | None |
If you're forwarding two-factor codes, banking alerts, or work messages, not storing your texts and keeping your contacts on your device are the privacy properties that count — and they're documented in each app's own policy.
What the free version really gives you
SMS Forwarder advertises a free tier, and it's worth knowing exactly what it includes, because this is the single most common complaint in its reviews. New users get 7 days of all features. After that, the free tier keeps one simple filter that forwards every incoming message to a single destination — capped at 50 messages per day by email — with no contact filtering, text rules, message templates, multiple recipients, or outgoing-SMS forwarding. Those are all premium-only, per GawkAr's own feature page.
PhoneLeash takes a more straightforward approach: a 30-day trial with full functionality, then a paid plan (full pricing here):
- OTP-only plan — $0.99/month. Forwards only verification and two-factor codes.
- Personal plan — $4.50/month (billed annually). Full SMS, MMS, and notification forwarding.
- Commercial plan — $14.95/month. For businesses forwarding across multiple devices.
A longer trial, filtering included, and no surprise about what "free" actually does.
True WhatsApp forwarding, not a notification dump
Both apps can relay WhatsApp, but not in the same way. GawkAr forwards WhatsApp as part of generic app-notification relaying — you get whatever text Android puts in the notification, which can be collapsed, grouped, or truncated. PhoneLeash has purpose-built WhatsApp support that handles it as a first-class messaging source, forwarding the sender and message cleanly. Same idea applies to MMS and attachments, which PhoneLeash forwards as well.
Where SMS Forwarder by GawkAr wins
Credit where it's due. GawkAr's app has genuine strengths PhoneLeash does not match:
- More destinations. Telegram (their bot or your own), URL/webhooks, and VKontakte — useful for developers, automation, and the Russian-speaking market.
- Notification forwarding from any app. If you want to relay notifications from arbitrary apps, not just messaging, GawkAr does that.
- A permanent free tier, if a single forward-everything filter is all you need.
If forwarding to Telegram or a webhook, or relaying arbitrary app notifications, is your core requirement, GawkAr's app is the better tool and we'd point you to it.
How to switch from GawkAr to PhoneLeash
Moving over takes about five minutes. Set up PhoneLeash first and confirm it works before removing the old app, so you never miss a message in between.
- Install PhoneLeash from Google Play and enter your destination (email address or another phone number). No account or email confirmation needed.
- Grant the three permissions it asks for, and — importantly — exclude PhoneLeash from battery optimization when prompted. The single most common "it stopped working" complaint about forwarding apps is the OS killing them in the background; this step prevents it.
- Send yourself a test text and confirm it lands at your destination, with a reply if you forward to email.
- Turn off forwarding in SMS Forwarder before removing it — open its filter and disable it so it isn't sending alongside PhoneLeash.
- Cancel your GawkAr subscription (if you have one) in Google Play → Subscriptions, delete your account in the SMS Forwarder app settings (at the very bottom), then uninstall it.
That's it — PhoneLeash now handles your messages, including RCS and replies.
Which should you choose?
- You want simple setup, replies, RCS, and stronger privacy → PhoneLeash.
- You need Telegram, webhooks, VKontakte, or forwarding of arbitrary app notifications → SMS Forwarder by GawkAr.
- You want a longer full-feature trial and predictable, low pricing → PhoneLeash.
- You want a permanent free tier and only need to send everything to one place → SMS Forwarder by GawkAr.
If PhoneLeash fits, you can install it from Google Play and the 30-day trial gives you the full feature set — including reply-from-email and RCS forwarding — to compare on your own phone before paying anything. It's also available on iPhone.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best app to forward SMS to email on Android?
PhoneLeash is one of the best Android apps for forwarding SMS to email. It has been on the Play Store since 2011 with 500,000+ installs, sets up in minutes with no account to create, forwards SMS, MMS, RCS, and WhatsApp, and is the only major forwarding app that lets you reply to a text directly from your email inbox. It offers a 30-day full-feature trial, then plans from $0.99/month.
How do I forward text messages to my email automatically?
Install a forwarding app such as PhoneLeash on the Android phone whose texts you want to forward, enter your email address as the destination, and grant the SMS and notification permissions. Incoming texts — including RCS and WhatsApp — are then forwarded to your inbox automatically, usually within a few seconds, and you can reply directly from email.
Is SMS Forwarder by GawkAr free?
Partly. New users get a 7-day trial of all features. After that, the free tier keeps a single filter that forwards every message to one destination, capped at 50 messages/day by email, with filtering and templates locked behind premium. PhoneLeash offers a 30-day full-feature trial, then plans from $0.99/month with filtering included.
Does SMS Forwarder support RCS?
No — its own support page states the app can't access RCS messages and recommends users disable RCS or accept that those messages won't be forwarded. PhoneLeash forwards RCS via notification access.
Can I reply to forwarded messages?
With PhoneLeash, yes — reply from email or a second phone and the SMS is sent from your phone. This works for both email and phone-to-phone forwarding. SMS Forwarder by GawkAr is one-way only.
Is switching apps complicated?
No. Your previously forwarded messages already live in whatever inbox they were sent to. Installing PhoneLeash only changes how future messages are handled — there's no account to create, and setup takes a couple of minutes.