SMS Spam Dashboard

A look at real text messages, each tagged as normal (ham) or junk (spam) — and what makes the spam stand out.

How they differ

Normal vs. spam

Most messages are normal — spam is the minority.

Message length

Spam messages are longer — they pack in offers and phone numbers.

The words that give it away

Common in spam

The top word is "call" (used 370 times) — followed by "free" (228) and "txt" (170). Classic sales language.

Common in normal texts

Everyday, conversational words between friends.

The neural network, live

Turn each clue on or off below — the network re-learns from scratch on thousands of real messages every time, and you'll see its accuracy change. Then type a message and watch the signals flow to a verdict. Blue lines push toward normal, red toward spam — thicker means stronger.

Clues the network may use:
Try:

See for yourself

👆 Click any message to drop it into the network above and watch it get sorted.

ham  normal messages
    spam  spam messages

      Source: SMS Spam Collection v.1 — 5,572 English messages compiled for research. Charts summarise the whole set.