Great question, I always wondered that. I think it’s for if you use Siri and the person has multiple numbers. For example Siri call John iPhone. Or Siri call John office.
I’m not sure. But always wondered about this also.
The blue/green bubbles show if someone’s number or email is associated with the iMessage service.
I believe the labels in Contacts is mostly for Siri usage and organization.
Does anyone in this forum use the IMessage Contact Key Verification feature in iMessage? If so, what’s your opinion of its functionality? Seems to be a nice feature.
The blue bubble signifies that it has been sent via Messages and a green bubble means that it has been sent as a text via a carrier.
Those labels (for different phone numbers, also for different email addresses, relations, and mailing addresses – maybe more things) have been a part of the Contacts app from its very beginning, long predating Siri.
I don’t know that there is any functionality other than it being a way for the user to know which address or number to use. But I also don’t know that there isn’t. And, like @joeg3 and @Jjm , I’ve long wondered…
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Oh definitely. They just became useful in a new way with Siri. Here it is back in the OS X Public Beta:
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The default “home” email address is weird. Like hello 1998 your dial up AOL called.
Apple Contacts is in desperate need of an update/overhaul. It totally feels like it is from 1998.
Yes, our family had problems with iMessage while traveling outside of the US. 2 parents with new e-sims (and phone numbers), 2 kids with wifi only iphones. Many unseen and undelivered messages. Some worked after entering icloud email addresses. We also used Whatsapp as a fallback.