A New Feature in IOS 26 Helps Eliminate Text Spam.
In iOS 26, Apple made it easier for users to combat spam and general clutter in their Messages folder. Your iPhone will detect and hide spam messages, and the “Unknown Senders” feature lets you filter messages from unknown senders. You can also disable push notifications for these messages to reduce the frequency of alerts about messages you don’t need.
Please note that this feature only works on iOS, so if you have Messages synced on your Mac, you will see all messages and receive notifications for all messages unless you turn off notifications for specific conversations.
How to Reduce Clutter in Messages on iOS
To filter messages from unknown numbers into a separate folder, go to Settings > Apps > Messages and enable “Unknown Senders.” You can also do this in the Messages app on your iPhone by tapping the three horizontal menu bars in the upper-right corner and selecting “Manage Filtering.” Enabling “Unknown Senders” will hide notifications and move messages to the “Unknown Senders” list. If you want to allow (or block) specific types of notifications, tap “Allow Notifications ” and toggle categories on or off:
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The Urgent Requests category includes alerts, confirmation codes, and urgent requests.
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The “Private Messages” category includes messages that are marked as not being sent by a company or organization.
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Transactions include order updates, receipts, and confirmations.
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Promotions include general offers and updates sent to multiple recipients.
Most users will need to enable timed notifications to receive messages containing one-time passwords (TOTPs) and other urgent alerts. You can also enable personalized notifications to avoid missing messages addressed to you personally from real people not saved in your contacts.
If you allow notifications, messages categorized in these ways will only appear in your message list for 12 hours, after which they will be moved to the “Unknown Senders” category to help organize your primary inbox. If you want to make an unknown sender known to prevent future messages from being filtered, open the conversation and click “Mark as Known” at the bottom or add the number to your contacts. A known sender is anyone you’ve added to your contacts, sent a message to, or marked as known in a conversation.
Finally, if you enable the “Filter Spam” feature in the same device settings menu, Apple will filter messages marked as spam to a separate spam list and hide notifications. You can view these messages and conversations with unknown senders at any time via Messages > Menu .