Texting is the most popular way to communicate with friends and family.
Texting is incredibly convenient and can help you get a message sent to you sometimes in a matter of seconds.
However, sometimes there are issues with friends who don’t text back.
This can be really frustrating and make you wonder if it is you or if it is them.
Chances are there is a mixture of both issues going on.
However, there are some real reasons you may not hear back from your friends.
Let’s look at 20 reasons your friends don’t text back.
Some of these may surprise you.
1. Not Interested In Talking
Everyone has bad days, and sometimes those bad days make it so that you are not interested in talking to your friends.
If you find that this happens to you at times, don’t be surprised if it happens to your friends as well.
There are moments in life when we just need silence, and we need to be alone.
Your friend may just be going through a time when they need space and need to not talk to anyone for a little while.
This is entirely normal behavior and will likely have no impact at all on your friendship long term.
2. Trying To Pull Away
Sadly, sometimes a friend does not text back because they are starting to pull away.
Maybe it is something you did or something about how you live your life that makes your friend realize they are no longer interested in being part of your social circle.
This is a tough one to take, and if you text a friend a few times and don’t get a response, this could very well be the problem.
One thing you can try doing is to talk to a mutual friend and see if there is anything they know about why the friend may not be talking to you.
If you realize that a mistake was made or something was said to insult the person, maybe one of your next texts can be an apology.
3. Found New Social Circles
Sometimes people find a new group of friends to hang out with
The social circles that people have, especially in their younger years, tend to change quite often.
As you make friends and acquaintances, you may find that you are more comfortable in one group over another group.
This can become difficult when you are texting a friend, and you don’t hear back simply because they have moved on.
The time that you spent with that friend over the years may be a sad reminder of what you are losing.
This can happen in life, and if it does, you should work on finding social groups that better fit your interests and needs, and don’t feel obligated to a single friend.
This is especially important when the friend won’t even call or text you back.
4. Hands Are Tied
There are times when a person will not text back simply because their hands are busy doing something else.
Whether you are painting a room, cooking dinner, or changing a diaper, there are times when you just can’t pick up the phone and text back.
When people are busy, they sometimes then forget to go back and answer the text message that they received earlier in the day.
Overall, the fact that it takes at least one and sometimes two hands to text back can make it difficult for some people to get back to you as quickly as you would like.
Those who are working outside or with food are going to want to make sure that their phone does not get destroyed simply by texting with dirty or greasy or sticky hands.
Therefore, it is best to have a bit of patience and see if your friend eventually sends you a message.
5. Work Restrictions
More and more workplaces are trying to discourage texting while at work.
The problem with texting while at work is that it will decrease the productivity of the employee.
Employees can’t possibly work as hard as they need to if they are distracted by texts from their family and friends all day.
Don’t be surprised if your friend is not texting back when they are at work.
Chances are they have a restriction in place that will not allow them to answer you at that time.
6. Busy And Distracted
Sometimes people get busy with work, family, or life and they are a bit distracted.
They may get the rest of their tasks done and then wonder what it was they forgot they needed to do.
Some will remember that they have not yet answered your text while others will never remember until you text them again.
This is a common reason for not responding to text messages.
Typically, when your friend does respond, they will say something about how they were distracted or busy and never had the chance to respond to your message.
This reason likely has nothing to do with your friendship.
7. Kids
Kids can keep any adult from getting done the things that they need to get done.
If you have kids, especially young ones, you may find that it is hard to keep up with your conversations and social obligations.
The kids take your attention and your time, and it makes it hard to just answer a text message at times.
Therefore, if you are trying to get in touch with a friend who has young children, don’t be surprised if they ignore your text.
Chances are they want to respond, but they simply don’t have the time.
8. Priority Changes
Some people decide to take a break from their phone and their friends.
Depending on what they may have going on in life, a break from the phone is quite common.
People often realize they need to restructure their lives and change their priorities.
If they used to text you all day long, maybe they realized there are better things they need to do with their time.
Texting can be very time-consuming, and those who are working towards goals and changing priorities may not have nearly as much time to answer you.
9. Taking A Break From Phones
Do you know if your friend has simply decided to take a break from their phone?
Many times, people realize that they spend way too much time on their phones, which causes some trouble when it comes to obligations and work.
Some people don’t know how to control the amount of time that they spend on their phones.
Instead of trying to control, they simply have to put the phone away completely for a while.
If you are worried that your friend has not texted back, maybe they are making a conscious effort not to be spending as much time on their cell phone.
In today’s world, this is a very popular goal for people.
10. Driving
A very simple reason a friend may not be texting you back is that they are driving.
It is illegal to text and drive.
When you think about what goes into texting and driving at the same time, it is no surprise this is considered to be so dangerous.
People who text and drive are often the cause of an accident.
Some cell phones will even send a message back letting you know that your friend is driving the car, and this is why they can’t respond.
Texting and driving is a serious problem, and it is unfortunate to think that some people still do it.
The best thing to do is to try and be patient and give your friend who may be driving some time to text you back.
You never want to pressure someone who is on the road and feels obligated to text and drive at the same time.
11. In The Middle Of Reading/Working
Some people work or read on their phones.
When a text message comes through, it can be very disturbing.
Sometimes it means that you have to leave the activity that you are doing to try and respond to the message.
This is frustrating and sometimes, if your internet speed is not fast, it will take quite a bit of time to exit the text messaging app and then get back into the thing that you were doing when you had to answer a text.
A friend may not respond to your message simply because they were busy using their phone.
If this is the case, they will likely respond as soon as they are finished with that task.
The only problem is that it may not alert them to a reminder that they have not yet responded to you.
12. Not Good With A Phone
Although it may be hard to believe, some people are not good with their phones.
You can spend weeks teaching some friends about phones, and they still just don’t get it.
Many people think of a cell phone as something that you can’t live without.
However, others really don’t like them and would rather not complicate their lives with all that the cell phone brings along with it.
Not being good with a phone is a major reason that your friends may not be texting you back.
13. Believe In Calling And Not Texting
Some people refuse to text back because they don’t believe it is a good communication method.
Some people think that if you want to talk to someone, you should simply pick up the phone and call them.
If you can’t make a phone call, then you may not really be able to have a conversation or relationship with this friend.
Many people get frustrated by the overall fact that cell phones are starting to rule the world and there is not much communication between people.
Most don’t consider text messages to be a great form of communication.
The problem with text messaging is that there is no body language or facial expressions involved.
This leads to miscommunication and issues between people when there never needed to be a problem.
Some find that fights can start simply because a person has read a text message the wrong way.
These people often decide to give up on text messaging completely.
14. Forget To Hit Send
Another simple but common reason people don’t respond to message is that they forget to hit send.
When you are finished typing a text message, you must hit send for it to make it to the other person.
The phone never really alerts you to the fact that you typed a message but never sent it.
Later in the day, your friend may text you to ask why you didn’t respond to something.
This is often the only indication that you never sent the message initially.
Forgetting to hit send often happens if you are busy or in the middle of other activities and a message comes in.
This happens quite often, and you start your response and then get distracted by something else and forget to send the message to your friend.
Overall, this can happen quite often for people.
The response you will get to a message like this will probably be something like, “I forgot to hit send earlier.”
In addition to forgetting to hit send, there are times when a message did not go through simply because there was an interruption in the service or reception.
The message can be delayed, and then it will go through later in the day.
In remote locations or when on vacation and away from great phone service, you may wait several hours to hear back from your friend simply because of a phone reception issue.
15. Overwhelmed With Texting
Some people have a lot of text messages that come through.
These messages may be related to family and friend issues, but they can also be related to work issues.
Therefore, people can feel as though their phone is exploding with messages all day long.
This can typically be a frustrating experience and leave people wanting to just turn their phone off.
If you have ever had a day like this when you felt attached to your phone and stuck having to listen to message after message coming through, it may be overwhelming.
When you don’t hear back from your friend, they could just be overly busy with other things going on, and they simply can’t get back to you at that moment.
16. Don’t Have Time To Start A Conversation
Sometimes your text message may be the start of a conversation.
You could be asking a friend about their plans coming up or their opinion about a life event that you have going on.
If your friend does not have the time to get involved in a conversation at the moment, they may choose not to respond at the time.
This is quite common and could just be something that you don’t need a response to immediately.
If you are asking a friend where they want to meet for lunch in a half-hour or what they want to do next summer, your response time may be a bit different.
People tend to want to deal with the immediate needs and not worry about long-term issues until they have some more time.
17. Not Sure What To Say
Have you thought about the fact that whatever you texted your friend might not be something that they can respond to at the moment?
Many times, people will avoid responding to your message simply because they don’t know how to.
Maybe the question you asked was controversial.
Maybe you stated something that was out of the ordinary, and your friend did not know what to say or how to approach the topic with you.
Not having a good response to your question or comment is a very fair reason for a friend not to text back.
Chances are they will wait until they have a bit more time to think over a response and give you a complete and thorough answer to your text.
For some people, this could be a day or so, and others will probably just avoid answering your message altogether.
18. You Are Sending Too Many Texts
Have you stopped to consider how many messages you send your friend?
Your friend may have started out being nice by answering all of your messages each time that you sent them.
However, after a while, the friend may be getting a bit burnt out on all the messages you continue to send.
Therefore, it can make sense to start being a bit more cautious about when and how you text.
Not everything that goes on in a day needs to be shared.
Maybe your friend thinks that you should be handling some of the issues you are having on your own without their advice.
Maybe your friends feel as though you are only worrying about yourself and not asking how they are doing or how they think.
Make sure that, when you are looking for advice and direction through text messages, you also remember to be a good friend at all times.
19. They Don’t Feel Like Responding
Although it can be related to you personally, sometimes people don’t want to respond simply because they don’t feel like it.
This is not always caused by an issue that you created, and it can simply be because your friend doesn’t want to respond at the moment.
Responding to a text message takes time, and it can distract from some kind of an event that you may have gone to.
Sometimes your friend does not respond simply because they don’t feel like it.
Try not to take this personally because it could be something they are going through more than an issue between you and the friend.
Give people time, don’t overwhelm them with a message, and eventually, they will respond and let you know that they are fine.
If you don’t hear from your friend, they may have moved on and decided that there are friends who are a better fit for them.
20. They Simply Missed The Text
Last but certainly not least is the fact that your friend may have just missed your text message.
Sometimes a phone will not alert for whatever reason.
Other times, the friend was on a call, and then when they got off, they missed your message.
If this is the case they will often see the message the next time they get a message to come through.
Try not to worry too much when a friend doesn’t respond.
As you have seen from these 20 reasons, most of the time, the reason you didn’t get a response was related to the friend and not to something that you did.
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meow says
i texrted my friends on all platofrms as well as call twice and theyre still not answering haha. Maybe just busy 🙂
Mara james says
That’s a good way to think of it !
aloneypersonwithnofriends says
I guest I don’t have a friend anymore 😢
Naomi says
I feel this way too, it’s sad but try to move on and either make new friends but even better just take care of yourself because you are important and I hope you realize that
kaydenz says
this is happening to me my friend didnt text me back and i only put 5 letters
life is just life says
I guest I don’t have a friend anymore 😢
Joshua Samson. says
Really complicated.. Just love and respect yourself
Morgan says
My friend barely ever texts back but I only call her on weekends
Jan says
How about an 3 decade friend (?) who texts periodically and expects a response … but when I text periodically I don’t receive one? We are both busy moms with intense careers. But this seems odd.
Becky says
Yikes…..talk about a selfish person!
dodo says
well i need to chill with the messages i send
Anonymous says
my friends text in the group chat but when I say something no one responds and its like they all leave the minute I say something what should I do?
Brian Renzo says
I think this information helps, widens my critical thinking
John Willard says
I guess I’m gonna be the next person that loses a friend. Not from death, just from not responding back to my texts.
Anonymous says
same
Halsey brook says
That’s a good way to think of it !