Hi, It looks like the system cut off my email response, so here it is again.
Summary
The SmartThings iOS app in version 1.7.41.12 appears to have a regression affecting all SMS/text‑message features across SmartThings Home Monitor (STHM) and Automations.
The issue consists of three failures:
1. App Crash on Editing SMS Recipient
When attempting to configure “Send a text message” (in either STHM → Reactions or Routines → Actions), the app crashes immediately upon tapping the recipient field.
2. Home Monitor Loses Previously‑Saved SMS Recipient
If SmartThings Home Monitor was previously configured with an SMS recipient:
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The recipient disappears after the app update.
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The setting is missing, and the user cannot re‑add it due to the crash.
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No SMS messages are sent, even when STHM detects an intrusion/leak/smoke event.
3. Routines Retain Old Recipient but Do Not Send the SMS
For routines created before the update:
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The recipient appears to remain stored internally.
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The routine does NOT send the text when triggered.
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Editing the action is impossible because tapping the field crashes the app.
Steps to Reproduce
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Open SmartThings for iOS (v1.7.41.12).
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Create or edit any Routine.
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Add an action: Notify → Send a text message.
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Tap the recipient field to type a name or phone number.
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App crashes instantly.
-or-
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Open SmartThings Home Monitor → Settings → Reactions.
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Choose Security / Smoke / Leak.
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Select Send a text message.
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Tap the recipient field → App crashes.
Actual Results
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App force‑closes every time the user taps the SMS recipient field.
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Home Monitor no longer has an SMS recipient and cannot send texts.
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Routines with pre‑existing SMS actions still trigger but never send the text.
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SMS functionality is effectively 100% broken across the entire app.
Expected Results
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User should be able to type a phone number or choose a contact.
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STHM and Routines should send SMS messages as configured.
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Previously stored SMS recipients should persist across app updates.
Impact Severity
Critical — affects core safety/security notifications:
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Intrusion alerts
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Leak alerts
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Smoke/CO alerts
Users relying on SMS for emergency notifications may receive no alerts at all, despite events being logged in history.
Workaround
To continue to have the app text from all SMS Text feature implementations, follow these steps:
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In iOS settings, in the SmartThings settings, select Contacts and set the setting to Limited Access. In the Edit selected contacts, select 1 contact (the contact you wish to notify). Note: I have only tested this with one contact because I only need 1 contact.
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In SmartThings, in the Home Monitor app or any other place the SMS Text feature is used, go to the field that holds the Contact number (or name), and enter the Contact’s phone number. (Name did NOT work for me).
Suspected Cause
Based on repeated observations over multiple app releases, this issue appears to surface whenever the SmartThings iOS app is updated, often requiring users to re‑enter SMS recipients and, in many cases, encountering app crashes during that process. With the most recent update, the behavior changed slightly in that the issue did not resolve at all until the workaround described above was applied.
One possible contributing factor may be the app’s interaction with iOS Contacts. In environments where a user has a large number of contacts, or where contacts are synchronized from external sources such as Microsoft Exchange (as is the case for me), the app appears to become unstable when accessing the contact list. In testing, limiting SmartThings’ contact access to a single contact allowed the feature to function reliably, which may indicate a scalability or memory‑handling issue when processing larger contact datasets. This may be worth validating against test environments with higher contact counts.
This behavior has been observable for several years, across multiple versions of the app, and has been discussed periodically in community forums. While I understand the challenges of prioritization and resource allocation, the recurring nature of this issue suggests an opportunity for a more permanent fix. Since I have identified a consistent workaround and provided detailed reproduction steps and observations above, I hope this information is helpful in diagnosing the underlying cause and improving the reliability of this feature for users who depend on SMS notifications for safety and security events.
Attachments / Notes
- Behavior reproducible 100% of the time with 800 contacts and set to Full Access under SmartThings settings.
I have also noticed that every time there is an update to the App, I must go back into each Add Text Message Recipients entry and redo it. That’s been going on for years. But this is a new “feature”!