Sending an SMS with Unicode

Nexmo's SMS API supports Unicode characters too, which you will need to use when communicating with customers in Chinese, Japanese and Korean.

To send an SMS that contains Unicode characters, replace the following variables in the example below:

Key	Description
`TO_NUMBER`	The number you are sending the SMS to, for example `447700900000`.
`NEXMO_API_KEY`	You can find this in your Nexmo Dashboard.
`NEXMO_API_SECRET`	You can find this in your Nexmo Dashboard.

Write the code

Add the following to send-an-sms-with-unicode.sh:

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curl -X "POST" "https://rest.nexmo.com/sms/json" \
  -d "from=AcmeInc" \
  -d "to=$TO_NUMBER" \
  -d "text=こんにちは世界" \
  -d "type=unicode" \
  -d "api_key=$NEXMO_API_KEY" \
  -d "api_secret=$NEXMO_API_SECRET"

View full source

Run your code

Save this file to your machine and run it:

sh send-an-sms-with-unicode.sh

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

npm install nexmo

Initialize your dependencies

Create a file named send-unicode-sms.js and add the following code:

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const Nexmo = require('nexmo')

const nexmo = new Nexmo({
  apiKey: NEXMO_API_KEY,
  apiSecret: NEXMO_API_SECRET
})

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Write the code

Add the following to send-unicode-sms.js:

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const from = FROM_NUMBER
const to = TO_NUMBER
const text = 'こんにちは世界'
const opts = {
  "type": "unicode"
}

nexmo.message.sendSms(from, to, text, opts, (err, responseData) => {
    if (err) {
        console.log(err);
    } else {
        if(responseData.messages[0]['status'] === "0") {
            console.log("Message sent successfully.");
        } else {
            console.log(`Message failed with error: ${responseData.messages[0]['error-text']}`);
        }
    }
})

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Run your code

Save this file to your machine and run it:

node send-unicode-sms.js

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Add the following to build.gradle:

compile 'com.nexmo:client:5.1.0'

Initialize your dependencies

Create a class named SendUnicodeMessage and add the following code to the main method:

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NexmoClient client = NexmoClient.builder().apiKey(NEXMO_API_KEY).apiSecret(NEXMO_API_SECRET).build();

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Write the code

Add the following to the main method of the SendUnicodeMessage class:

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TextMessage message = new TextMessage("Acme Inc", TO_NUMBER, "Blue Öyster Cult \uD83E\uDD18", true);

SmsSubmissionResponse responses = client.getSmsClient().submitMessage(message);

for (SmsSubmissionResponseMessage responseMessage : responses.getMessages()) {
    System.out.println(message);
}

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Run your code

We can use the application plugin for Gradle to simplify the running of our application. Update your build.gradle with the following:

apply plugin: 'application'
mainClassName = project.hasProperty('main') ? project.getProperty('main') : ''

Run the following gradle command to execute your application, replacing com.nexmo.quickstart.sms with the package containing SendUnicodeMessage:

gradle run -Pmain=com.nexmo.quickstart.sms.SendUnicodeMessage

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Install-Package Nexmo.Csharp.Client

Initialize your dependencies

Create a file named SMSSender.cs and add the following code:

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const string API_KEY = "NEXMO_API_KEY";
const string API_SECRET = "NEXMO_API_SECRET";

var client = new Client(creds: new Nexmo.Api.Request.Credentials(
    nexmoApiKey: API_KEY, nexmoApiSecret: API_SECRET));

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Write the code

Add the following to SMSSender.cs:

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var messageType = "unicode";
var results = client.SMS.Send(new SMS.SMSRequest
{
    from = NEXMO_BRAND_NAME,
    to = TO_NUMBER,
    text = message,
    type = messageType
});

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Prerequisites

Install dependencies

composer require nexmo

Initialize your dependencies

Create a file named send-unicode-sms.php and add the following code:

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$basic  = new \Nexmo\Client\Credentials\Basic(NEXMO_API_KEY, NEXMO_API_SECRET);
$client = new \Nexmo\Client($basic);

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Write the code

Add the following to send-unicode-sms.php:

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$message = $client->message()->send([
    'to' => TO_NUMBER,
    'from' => 'Acme Inc',
    'text' => 'こんにちは世界',
    'type' => 'unicode'
]);

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Run your code

Save this file to your machine and run it:

php -f send-unicode-sms.php

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

pip install nexmo

Initialize your dependencies

Create a file named send-an-sms-with-unicode.py and add the following code:

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import nexmo

client = nexmo.Client(key=NEXMO_API_KEY, secret=NEXMO_API_SECRET)

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Write the code

Add the following to send-an-sms-with-unicode.py:

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client.send_message({
    'from': 'Acme Inc',
    'to': TO_NUMBER,
    'text': 'こんにちは世界',
    'type': 'unicode',
})

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Run your code

Save this file to your machine and run it:

python3 send-an-sms-with-unicode.py

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

gem install nexmo

Initialize your dependencies

Create a file named send-unicode-sms.rb and add the following code:

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client = Nexmo::Client.new(
  api_key: NEXMO_API_KEY,
  api_secret: NEXMO_API_SECRET
)

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Write the code

Add the following to send-unicode-sms.rb:

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client.sms.send(
  from: 'Acme Inc',
  to: TO_NUMBER,
  text: 'こんにちは世界',
  type: "unicode"
)

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Run your code

Save this file to your machine and run it:

ruby send-unicode-sms.rb

Try it out

When you run the example above, the text message will be sent to the mobile number specified with the Unicode characters intact.

Note that Unicode messages can only contain 70 characters, rather than the usual 160. There's more information about this on the help page

Sending an SMS with Unicode

Write the code

Run your code

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Initialize your dependencies

Write the code

Run your code

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Initialize your dependencies

Write the code

Run your code

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Initialize your dependencies

Write the code

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Initialize your dependencies

Write the code

Run your code

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Initialize your dependencies

Write the code

Run your code

Prerequisites

Install dependencies

Initialize your dependencies

Write the code

Run your code

Try it out

Further reading