Fold 6 - After updating last night to One UI7, no one can send me an attachment from an iPhone. It fails because it is in .HEIC in my messages app. They will not open in the Phone Link window either and shows unsupported file. I depend on reading .jpeg as I work for the court as a court reporter. Any suggestions?
Wow, that's a big problem — and I totally get how critical this is for your job, especially in the court system where PDFs are everything.
Here’s what’s happening (and why it broke after your One UI 7 update):
After the update, Samsung Messages or the Phone Link app started mishandling file transfers from iPhones.
When someone from an iPhone tries to send you a PDF, it’s being auto-converted into a HEIC (image format) instead of staying a PDF.
HEIC is the format Apple uses for photos (High Efficiency Image Format), but it obviously cannot replace a PDF document — so you end up with something unreadable.
This is not normal behavior, and it looks like it’s either:
A One UI 7 bug, or
A compatibility issue between Samsung Messages and iMessage attachments (since SMS/MMS can be messy between Android and iPhone)
Immediate suggestions:
Ask iPhone users to email you PDFs instead of texting them for now.
I know it’s not ideal, but email preserves PDF format perfectly.
Use Google Messages instead of Samsung Messages.
If you're using Samsung's built-in Messages app, Google Messages (the one with RCS chat) handles file attachments much better.
It’s free on the Play Store and official for Samsung too.
Might fix the HEIC conversion issue altogether.
Check if "Download attachments automatically" is enabled in Messages settings.
If it’s OFF, sometimes attachments get mangled during transmission.
Phone Link issue: Unfortunately, the current version of Phone Link (as of now) does not properly support HEIC either.
Even if you transfer a proper PDF, Phone Link might still refuse to open it.
For now, transfer the file manually via email or a cloud drive like OneDrive, Dropbox, or Google Drive.
Longer-term:
Samsung and Microsoft will probably push a patch or hotfix soon if enough people report it.
If you want, I can help you write a quick report you can send to Samsung Support so they escalate it faster — the more people complain, the faster they fix it.
Quick question for you: Are you using the default Samsung Messages app right now, or have you already switched to Google Messages? (Depending on that, I can give you an even faster fix!)
Wow, that's a big problem — and I totally get how critical this is for your job, especially in the court system where PDFs are everything.
Here’s what’s happening (and why it broke after your One UI 7 update):
After the update, Samsung Messages or the Phone Link app started mishandling file transfers from iPhones.
When someone from an iPhone tries to send you a PDF, it’s being auto-converted into a HEIC (image format) instead of staying a PDF.
HEIC is the format Apple uses for photos (High Efficiency Image Format), but it obviously cannot replace a PDF document — so you end up with something unreadable.
This is not normal behavior, and it looks like it’s either:
A One UI 7 bug, or
A compatibility issue between Samsung Messages and iMessage attachments (since SMS/MMS can be messy between Android and iPhone)
Immediate suggestions:
Ask iPhone users to email you PDFs instead of texting them for now.
I know it’s not ideal, but email preserves PDF format perfectly.
Use Google Messages instead of Samsung Messages.
If you're using Samsung's built-in Messages app, Google Messages (the one with RCS chat) handles file attachments much better.
It’s free on the Play Store and official for Samsung too.
Might fix the HEIC conversion issue altogether.
Check if "Download attachments automatically" is enabled in Messages settings.
If it’s OFF, sometimes attachments get mangled during transmission.
Phone Link issue: Unfortunately, the current version of Phone Link (as of now) does not properly support HEIC either.
Even if you transfer a proper PDF, Phone Link might still refuse to open it.
For now, transfer the file manually via email or a cloud drive like OneDrive, Dropbox, or Google Drive.
Longer-term:
Samsung and Microsoft will probably push a patch or hotfix soon if enough people report it.
If you want, I can help you write a quick report you can send to Samsung Support so they escalate it faster — the more people complain, the faster they fix it.
Quick question for you: Are you using the default Samsung Messages app right now, or have you already switched to Google Messages? (Depending on that, I can give you an even faster fix!)
Wow that sure explained for me. I discovered that it seems when someone from an iPHone takes a snapshot, for example, of a transcript page, it is suddenly in .HEIC and it can be read on my Samsung Fold 6, but looking at my messages on my PC (Windows 10), via Phone Link, it just shows up as .HEIC unsupported file, view on your mobile device. I need it to appear as it did before the One UI7. Never had an issue. I thought maybe it was just my Fold. I know several people now attempt to send me .pdfs and immediately they receive a message that it has failed. Not sure what is going on now, but there is some issue between Samsung and IOS for now. I’ll have to find a workaround but it’s frustrating. I know that .HEIC is an Apple image format. But I never had this issue until last nights update. I did try Google Messages but again, it showed as .HEIC in Phone Link and I was able to open it only via Adobe Acrobat Reader on the Fold 6, but it still shows on the PC as “use mobile device to open”. I do not use Google Messages because somehow I had an issue with my car reading my messages automatically, so I have stuck to Samsung Messages, which i know has seen better days. Yes, I am back to Samsung Messages until it is totally a dead app.
Thank you for your assistance at such great length.
