Message Logs is a Messaging Insights page that allows you to access the information about the status of your messages and see what’s happening to them at Bandwidth before the delivery information is received. It also lets you follow the flow of the message while it’s being sent.
Your results will include records from the past 30 days and a maximum of 10,000 records without filtering. While this data is generally presented within a minute of the messages being received, you may experience delays up to 15 minutes on high-traffic days or during periods of high volume sending.
Accessing Message Logs
Log in to the Bandwidth App.
In the side navigation bar, select Insights and click Messaging.
Select Message Logs.
Note: If you don't see the Messaging tab, please contact your Account Admin to enable the Messaging Insights role associated with your user.
Applying filters
Filters are available for you to investigate your messages, identifying a message or set of messages that may need further investigation. You can monitor the delivery details and gather further information that will help you manage the delivery of your messages. The following filters are available:
From Received Time and To Received Time can help you identify messages in a specific period of time.
From Number(s) and To Number(s) can be used to search for messages associated with specific numbers.
Message ID is available to find a specific message.
Error Code and Status can be used to investigate delivery status of messages (e.g., specific messages that failed or blocked for a specific reason).
Message Type, Product, Direction, and Carrier can be used to further specify the details of a message to isolate a trend in data that could help you identify how to improve delivery.
Campaign and Campaign ID are available for you to investigate messages by campaign. Note: To view the Campaign ID field, select Registered from the Campaign drop-down menu.
Message Size and Segment Count can help you search for messages that may be exceeding limits and causing blocks. There are limits to message size and segment count of messages.
Source Country and Destination Country can help you identify and isolate message delivery by country.
You also have the flexibility to adjust the timezone and columns you want to view. Above the filters, you'll find several options that allow you to configure and download Message Logs:
Close Filter: This option allows you to expand or collapse filters to see more results with the filter closed.
Timezone: While all messages are recorded in Universal Coordinated Time (UTC), this option allows you to filter and display your message data in the timezone that makes the most sense for you.
Settings: This option opens a window where you can toggle columns on or off to decide which of them should appear in the table. Message ID, Received Date/Time, Type, Direction, From, To, Status, Error, Carrier, and Campaign ID columns will appear by default. You can add or remove any of them (except for the Message ID), or add additional ones.
Download: This option allows you to download your filtered results.
Interpreting message data
Message ID: The unique ID associated with the message.
Date/Time (UTC -04:00): The date and time Bandwidth received the message in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). You can use filters to search for messages received in the last 30 days.
Direction: This indicates whether the message is inbound or outbound.
From: The sender's phone number.
To: The receiver's phone number.
Status: The current status of the message, which is derived from the event status as the message is processed. For more information, please see the list of message statuses below.
Error: The 4-digit messaging error code associated with the message. For more information, please see the complete list of messaging error codes.
Carrier: The name of the carrier, either the originating or the destination one, depending on the direction of the message.
Campaign Class: The campaign class of the message, or unregistered. This only applies to A2P traffic where campaigns have been registered.
Campaign ID: The Campaign ID associated with your local A2P traffic.
Type: This indicates whether the message is SMS or MMS.
Segment Count: SMS messages that exceed the character limitation for their given encoding are broken into multiple parts in order to be sent or received. This is the total quantity of parts your message was broken into.
Message Size: This includes all the pieces of the message: headers, text, files, etc. Depending on the carrier, messages greater than 1 MB could be blocked.
Message Length: The length of the message content.
Attachment Count: The number of attachments the message has.
Recipient Count: The number of recipients the message has.
Product: The messaging product associated with the message.
Source Country and Destination Country: The countries associated with the message.
Investigating message delivery
To learn more about the delivery state of your messages, you can review the status and its associated error. When a message is sent or received, there are multiple statuses a message can process through before the message may reach its final state.
The diagram shows multiple statuses the message goes through as it's being sent through Bandwidth to its intended destination.
Outbound Status | Description |
RECEIVED | Bandwidth has received your request to send a message. This is the initial status when sending a message to indicate Bandwidth accepted the message. |
QUEUED | Bandwidth has successfully received the message and queued it prior to being sent downstream. |
SENDING | Bandwidth is in the process of sending your message to the downstream carrier. |
SENT | Bandwidth has sent the message and the carrier has accepted the message. This can be a final delivery status for messages when no delivery receipt (DLR) was requested or when no DLR was received from the carrier. |
FAILED | The message could not be sent. The error code associated with this message will provide more information about the specific reason for this final failure delivery status. |
DELIVERED | Bandwidth has received a delivery receipt (DLR) from the downstream carrier confirming successful delivery to the carrier or handset (when available). This represents a final successful delivery status. |
UNDELIVERED | The DLR received from the carrier indicated the message was not deliverable. The error code associated with this message will provide more information about the specific reason for this final failure delivery status. |
Inbound Status | Description |
RECEIVED | Bandwidth has received a request to send a message to a Bandwidth number. This is the initial status for inbound messages. |
ACCEPTED | The message was accepted by the customer. This is the most common final status for inbound messages, indicating successful receipt of a message. |
FAILED | The message could not be delivered to the customer. |
DELIVERED | This status indicates a DLR was requested by the carrier sending the message to Bandwidth. |
When a message reaches a final state of Accepted, Sent, Delivered, Failed, or Undelivered, there is a delivery receipt code associated with the message. The Error field indicates this code in Message Logs. If the message was successful, it will display a 0. If not, it will display a 4-digit error code. See the full list of messaging errors for the description and explanation of each error.
Note: If you send messages using SMPP and/or MM4, you may be more familiar with 3-digit SMPP and MM4 codes. The error codes you can search by in Message Logs are very similar: they have a leading digit that indicates whether the error is a client (customer) or service error.
Understanding message length and size
Message Logs include several fields that offer insights into message size and length. This information is crucial for understanding messages that have been divided into multiple segments, which in turn helps monitor costs and optimize delivery. Carriers impose limits on message size, and larger messages may be segmented, leading to increased costs and potentially longer delivery times:
Segment Count indicates the number of segments the original SMS message from the user is broken into before it's sent over the carrier networks. Because the number of supported characters in an SMS message is limited based on the encoding used, the message that exceeds that limit will be broken into multiple parts. Please see our character limitations and concatenation practices to learn more about why your messages may have multiple segments.
Message Length refers to the number of characters contained in the message. In the context of messaging services like SMS, message length is important because it can affect how the message is sent and billed. For example, a standard SMS message typically supports up to 160 characters using the GSM-7 encoding. If a message exceeds this limit, it may be split into multiple segments and sent as a concatenated message. You may notice that messages with greater lengths also show multiple segments listed. Understanding message length helps ensure efficient use of messaging resources and optimized cost management.
Message Size refers to the total amount of data, usually measured in bytes or kilobytes, that a message occupies when transmitted over a network. Unlike message length, which counts characters, message size accounts for the actual data footprint, including text encoding, any attached media (like images or audio), metadata, and protocol overhead. Message size is important because larger messages consume more bandwidth, can increase transmission time, and potentially incur higher costs. For example, an SMS text message is typically limited in size (up to 140 bytes for a single message), whereas multimedia messages (MMS) can be much larger due to attachments. Managing message size effectively helps optimize network performance and ensures smooth delivery.
Attachment Count and Recipient Count provide additional clarity about MMS messages. These fields can help you understand how many attachments and recipients were associated with a given message.
Questions? Please open a ticket with your Bandwidth Support Team or hit us up at (855) 864-7776!