A customer just told you the job went great, and the fastest way to turn that into a review is to text them the link right then. That instinct is right, and plenty of businesses text for reviews every day. Whether it's legal, though, is a real question with a real regulatory answer, and in 2026 that answer got messier, not simpler. Here is what the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) actually requires, the one playbook that stays safe no matter how the current court fights resolve, and when it's smarter to skip texting altogether.
What the TCPA actually covers
The TCPA is a 1991 federal law built to stop unwanted phone solicitation, and courts and the FCC have extended it to cover text messages sent by an automated system. It's not about whether you personally tap send or a tool does it for you. What matters is the content of the message and whether the recipient agreed to receive it.
For a marketing or promotional text, the FCC's longstanding rule requires prior express written consent before you send the first one, meaning some documented, opt-in agreement, not just a phone number you happen to have on file. The message also has to identify your business by name, and it can only go out between 8am and 9pm in the recipient's time zone. None of that changes because the message is short, one-time, or feels like a favor to ask.
Is a review request "marketing"?
This is the actual gray area, and it's worth sitting with instead of guessing past it. The TCPA classifies a message by its content, not by your intent. A text that says “thanks for coming in, mind leaving us a quick Google review?” with nothing else attached leans informational, closer to a receipt or an appointment reminder than an ad. The moment you add anything promotional, a discount for leaving a review, a mention of a sale, a link to buy again, the same message reads as marketing, and the stricter consent rules apply without question.
The safest read: treat every review-request text as if it needs full marketing consent, even if a strict content-based argument might classify a bare-bones version as something lighter. Betting your business on a legal gray area you'd have to defend in court is a bad trade for the fifteen seconds a text saves you.
The playbook that's safe either way
You don't need a law degree to text customers safely. You need a short, boring checklist you follow every time, regardless of what a particular court decides this year.
- Get some form of consent (a checkbox at checkout, a signed intake form, a clear opt-in reply) before the first review-request text
- Keep a simple record of when and how each customer consented
- Text only between 8am and 9pm in the recipient's local time zone
- Say who you are in the message; don't send from an unlabeled number
- Send one ask, and at most one polite reminder, then stop
- Honor an opt-out immediately, whatever words it's phrased in, not just the word STOP
- Buy, scrape, or import a phone list and text it cold
- Assume a number given for a receipt or booking doubles as marketing consent
- Bundle the review ask with a coupon, discount, or giveaway
- Keep texting someone who has gone quiet after the first two messages
- Treat a favorable ruling in someone else's circuit as blanket cover for yours
If you already send appointment confirmations or receipts by text and want to add a review ask, the cleanest fix is one added line at signup or checkout, something like “we may also text you a quick request to review your experience.” That single sentence is what turns “we had their number” into “they agreed to this specific kind of message,” which is the actual gap most businesses get caught in.
Why 2026 made this messier
TCPA law is unusually unsettled this year, which is exactly why copying what a competitor does is bad advice right now. Three federal appeals courts issued conflicting rulings within months of each other.
- Fifth Circuit, February 2026: Bradford v. Sovereign Pest Control held the TCPA does not require written consent for automated telemarketing calls, oral or relationship-based consent can count too. Binding only in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi.
- Ninth Circuit, January 2026: Howard v. Republican National Committee held that text messages do count as “calls” under the TCPA's core definition, the opposite direction.
- Seventh Circuit, July 2026: Steidinger v. Blackstone Medical Services held that texts are not “telephone calls” for one specific do-not-call provision, narrowing liability for text-based do-not-call claims in Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin only.
Put together, that's a live three-way circuit split on questions that directly affect anyone texting customers, and it hasn't reached the Supreme Court yet. A ruling that favors businesses in one circuit is not a shield if you operate in, or text someone who lives in, a different one. This guide is general information, not legal advice, and if you're running review-request texts at real volume across state lines, a few hundred dollars with an attorney who tracks this area is cheap insurance against a mistake that costs a lot more.
What it costs to get wrong
Most real disputes don't start with “we sent a text.” They start with a missing consent record, an opt-out that got ignored, or a message sent outside the allowed hours. Those three things are worth actually auditing before you scale up a texting habit, not the general idea of texting itself.
Lower-risk ways to ask
If the consent bookkeeping sounds like more than you want to manage, texting isn't the only fast option. Email runs under the lighter CAN-SPAM rules instead of the TCPA, a QR code on the counter or receipt gets a customer to your review link in the same two taps with zero consent regime attached, and asking in person while handing over your direct review link avoids the question entirely. Our guide on how to ask for Google reviews has scripts for all three channels, plus the timing that actually moves response rates, which matters more than which channel you pick.
If you do keep texting in the mix, the templates worth using are the plain, clearly-labeled kind, not because of any TCPA nuance specifically, but because a message that states who you are and why you're texting is also the message least likely to read as spam to the recipient. Our review request templates are built that way already.
None of this changes what happens after the review lands. Once a customer does leave a review, replying to it well and quickly is what actually moves your rating over time, and that part carries none of the SMS baggage. See our guide to Google review automation for how the asking and the replying fit together as one system.