It used to be that only teenagers texted, but now almost all of us do. It is a great and convenient way to communicate. All of the carriers have gotten wind of this and decided to raise the price per text. Thankfully, there are alternatives. Here are a few great free apps that you can use to ditch the SMS plan with your wireless provider.

My favorite is Google Voice. It provides you with a new number to text from. It has all the extras without the extra charge. Sign up for a Google Voice account, and you can send an unlimited amount of texts from the inbox of your Gmail account or your phone. The Google Voice smartphone app sends you alerts whenever you receive a new text. Your conversations are saved online as well for you to view later. I use it and think it’s great.

Kik is a BBM alternative that works on the iPhone and Android. Kik sends its messages almost immediately, and you get a notification once it’s delivered and received. It’s a free app and you get unlimited messages.

Fring is a messaging app that connects to all of the instant messengers like AIM, Google Talk, among others. You can also make voice and video calls to others providing they have the app as well.

Text Plus Gives you a real number for sending and receiving texts. The only drawback is the ads. Pay a $1.99 fee, the ads disappear, and you can pick a number from your own area code. If the recipient that you are sending a text to has this app on their phone, then you can send photo messages as well.

Some of the other apps include Text Now which like Text Plus assigns you a real number, but also has ads. You can get rid of the ads for $0.99 a month or $5.99 a year. There’s also 'What’s App', which works on almost all major smartphone platforms, Meebo, Text Free, Group Me and of course for texting from iPhone to iPhone, iMessage. Try one of these apps and ditch the plan!

Wayne Tempel is a freelance writer who has contributed to many articles on the web. You can follow him on Twitter.