Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) is a standard way to send messages that include multimedia content to and from a mobile phone over a cellular network. Users and providers may refer to such a message as a PXT, a picture message, or a multimedia message. The MMS standard extends the core SMS (Short Message Service) capability, allowing the exchange of text messages greater than 160 characters in length. Unlike text-only SMS, MMS can deliver a variety of media, including up to forty seconds of video, one image, a slideshow of multiple images, or audio.
The most common use involves sending photographs from camera-equipped handsets. Media companies have utilized MMS on a commercial basis as a method of delivering news and entertainment content, and retailers have deployed it as a tool for delivering scannable coupon codes, product images, videos, and other information.
The 3GPP and groups fostered the development of the MMS standard, which is now continued by the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA).
Multimedia messaging service was built using the technology of SMS messaging, first developed in 1984 as a captive technology which enabled service providers to "collect a fee every time anyone snaps a photo."
Early MMS deployments were plagued by technical issues and frequent consumer disappointments. In recent years, MMS deployment by major technology companies have solved many of the early challenges through handset detection, content optimization, and increased throughput.
China was one of the early markets to make MMS a major commercial success, partly as the penetration rate of personal computers was modest but MMS-capable camera phones spread rapidly. The chairman and CEO of China Mobile said at the GSM Association Mobile Asia Congress in 2009 that MMS in China was now a mature service on par with SMS text messaging.
Europe's most advanced MMS market has been Norway, and in 2008, the Norwegian MMS usage level passed 84% of all mobile phone subscribers. Norwegian mobile subscribers sent on average one MMS per week.
Between 2010 and 2013, MMS traffic in the U.S. increased by 70% from 57 billion to 96 billion messages sent. This is due in part to the wide adoption of smartphones.
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