223 million texts to be sent over New Year

Brits to go SMS crazy on 31 December

View more images

31 December 2008 17:00 GMT / By Amy-Mae Elliott

This New Year will see a huge amount of text and picture messages sent, according to Orange.

The number of text and multimedia messages sent during the last day in December has increased steadily over the past few years and Orange says 2008 is set to be another record-breaker.

Last year, Orange customers sent 53 million texts and over 363,000 picture messages on New Year's Eve, apparently the mobile network's busiest time of the year.

This 31 December figures are expected to rise with Orange predicting to handle approximately 112 million SMS and 900,000 picture messages as people send more texts and snaps to friends, family and social networking sites and another 110 million sent on New Year's day.

Will you be texting around midnight tonight? Have you changed your Facebook status to reflect tonight's celebrations? Or will you Twitter to wish your followers a happy New Year? Let us know in the comments box below...