Review: Nokia Lumia 900 for AT&T
Windows Phone covers all the messaging must-haves. The platform offers email, SMS/MMS, social networking, IM, voicemail, and so on.
The email application is particularly powerful. Of course it works natively with Outlook and Exchange, but you can also mate any IMAP or POP email service to the device, including Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, and email from other providers. I like the way the email client treats threaded conversations.
The SMS/MMS client is fine and also does double-duty as the IM client for Windows Live. Conversations are threaded, and media such as photos or video are embedded inline with the text. Google Talk, Yahoo, AIM? Um, nope.
The biggest piece of the messaging pie with Windows Phone and the 900 is social networking integration. As noted above, the platform natively supports Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. This lets the user push content from the browser to Facebook, or from their photo album to Twitter, or from the SkyDrive to LinkedIn. It's all easy and seamless and works with but a few swipes and presses.
Beyond the native integration, you can of course use these social networks in their own, dedicated applications. Facebook and Twitter, in particular, make strong use of the Metro UI concept that Microsoft has adopted. Facebook for Windows Phone is close to being on par with the client offered to Android and iOS devices, but Twitter for Windows Phone is a decrepit app that sorely needs to be updated.