Free text messages from your tablet or iPad

I must admit that when I downloaded Google Voice for my iPad, I asked myself:  "What am I going to use it for?"  I got an answer.  Free text messages!  Google Voice for Android and Google Voice for iOS both work just fine on tablets, and both offer free text messaging over whatever connectivity is available (i.e. 3G, 4G, or Wi-Fi).

I should note that the iOS version isn't optimized for the iPad, meaning you'll have to scale it up if you want it run full-screen, but the functionality is there. The nice thing about using Google Voice (as opposed to another third-party app) is that it's tied to your Google Voice phone number and your Google Contacts, so in theory, the person who gets your text will see the text as they typically would if you sent it from your phone.