How To Leave Conversation On Iphone

If you've ever been included in a group text messaging thread that you had no intention on being a part of, you know how annoying it can be to have your iPhone (or iPad) chime repeatedly as new messages come in to the conversation you aren't following. The longstanding strategy has been to just mute the iOS device and let the conversation play out, but iOS 8 and newer versions have a better choice with the ability to leave an iMessage thread.

This is one of the many improvements introduced to Messages, and it works really quite well to abandon a group message conversation, and yes, it stops the messages from coming in to your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. There are a few things to note with this feature however, leaving a conversation in Messages only works when all of those in the message thread are using iMessage – if it's a group SMS, say there's an Android user in the thread as well, you're out of luck and can't leave the chat. Keep that in mind if the texts keep popping up.

How to Remove Yourself from a Group Messages Conversation on iPhone & iPad

You'll obviously need the latest version of iOS to be able to do this, though the people you are communicating with don't necessarily have to be on the latest version so long as they are still using iMessage.

Open the Messages app and choose the group message chat that you want to leave
Tap on the "i" Details button
Scroll all the way down to the bottom of the options, and choose the red "Leave This Conversation" button

Leave This Conversation to remove yourself from a group Messages chat

That's all there is to it, you'll now be missing any messages that are part of that group conversation.

You can delete the thread as well from the Messages app, or re-initiate a group conversation yourself with the same people you just left the conversation from, both of which will allow new messages to come through again.

Why is "Leave this Conversation" Greyed Out in Messages for iOS?

If you go to leave a messages conversation and find the option greyed out, it's almost certainly because one of the users in the group chat is either not using iMessage, or was using iMessage and either lost a signal or disabled the iMessage service. Typically if you're in a group chat with standard SMS messaging however, the option won't appear at all. In that case, you can either ignore the conversation, slip it onto Do Not Disturb, or maybe just repeatedly ask them to stop messaging you with the nifty new Quick Reply trick… good luck with that.

Messages icon