Google has done it. It might have taken more years than any of us predicted, but here we are. Google won the RCS battle in the US. All three big US carriers have now announced that they will pre-load Google Messages on their Android phones and use Google’s RCS.
Verizon joined AT&T and T-Mobile this morning, saying that they too will make Google Messages the default on their Android phones. However, unlike those other two, Verizon isn’t getting started with this change until next year (2022). That means we’ll get several phone releases throughout the next couple of quarters that won’t have Google Messages and will lack the cross-carrier RCS compatibility it brings.
Once 2022 rolls around, Verizon customers will be able to take advantage of RCS benefits, like sending and receiving high-quality photos and video, chatting over WiFi, seeing read receipts or when someone is typing, bigger and better group chats, and encrypted messages in one-on-one chats.
Verizon is also planning to bring full RCS access to users of their bad Message+ app. I’d imagine that enough people use that app that they can’t simply move on and get rid of it. Bad UI lives!
Of course, if you don’t want to wait for Verizon to add Google Messages to your phone or you don’t want to buy a new phone to get it, you can always install Google Messages today. RCS already works because Google pushed around the carriers to enable it everywhere without their help back in 2019.
Good job, everyone.
Yes make sure to rely on Google so they can harvest your data and scour your messages to censor and report you for wrongthink.
Dope. Hopefully it’s early 2022 to coincide with the then recently released Pixel 6
Didn’t carriers already say they would do this and then change their minds? Google just made it possible without the carriers having to be on board.
The news is that Google Messages will now be the default messaging app on the carriers (although I heard Verizon will still also have Verizon Messages, but also make it RCS compatible. With Google Messages being default the majority of Android users (not just tech nerds) will use it and benefit from all of it’s functionality.
They may have win the battle, but will not win the war until Apple adopts RCD
If Apple continues to to favour insecure and featureless SMS over RCS with end to end encryption as the fall back on iMessage then this will only serve as yet another example that Apple’s commitment to privacy and security is just a paper tiger used for misleading consumers with disingenuous marketing mumbo-jumbo.
I hope this is a big push to finally eliminate SMS once and for all so even Apple would need to adopt RCS
I hope this is a big push to finally eliminate SMS once and for all so even Apple would need to adopt RCS
Does this include the MVNOs though? ????
No. We’re talking about phones sold through carriers that have their own pre-installed software. As in Verizon Messages(Message+) will no longer be the default. You can use Google Messages on any MVNO.
He’ll hath frozen over
And yet you still have to choose between RCS and sync on Fi.
Does this mean RCS will finally work on Textra?
On my wishlist too!!
Always amazes me how lazy most consumers are in that they don’t change out or even know they can change out an SMS app on their new phone. I have had to literally download Google Messenger on to 3 family members’ phones to get them to use RCS even though they don’t understand the difference between RCS and SMS. I just tell them it is better but they really didn’t care. Sometimes I think it would be better for consumers to buy a phone with zero apps on the phone but with instructions on how to download apps from the PlayStore. It took my Mom 6 months to ask me how to download an app. She was arguing that Verizon cheated her by selling her a phone with no Facebook access.
I think RCS should be implemented to all messaging apps so we can decide to use it in Telegram, Google messages, signal, or some other popular messaging app.
Also, I hope Android defaults the RCS toggle to ON or most people won’t know to turn it on.
For realz! I am amazed that Google made RCS an opt-in feature instead of ON by default. I’ve seen people open Messages for the first time, see the RCS opt-in prompt, and quickly dismiss it because they think it is SPAM.
Wait… I thought Airplane Mode just made your phone faster, like an Airplane. Is that why I’ve gotten so good at the Google Dinosaur game?
The problem has been that Google didn’t release an API for RCS, so this apps couldn’t implement it if they wanted to
I understand. It’s dumb that they don’t. They think by their control of the API people are going to stick with Google/Android messages. It’s not a good app when it comes to the alternatives.
“She was arguing that Verizon cheated her by selling her a phone with no Facebook access.”
LOL Thanks for the laugh. BTW, I can relate to your frustration. My family members complain about not being able to make phone calls or surf the web. I usually find out later that they’ve accidentally toggled Airplane Mode.
Not caring about RCS doesn’t make people lazy. They just care about different things. I use Google Messages and only a few of the people I know use it too. There certainly are nice things about RCS but honestly I understand why some might not care. Messaging over RCS or not hasn’t really made much difference in my messaging other people either way. ????♂️
As someone who used to sell for VZW, I gotta say, it is wild how many people use message+. I found it’s mostly on vzw prepaid – those phones have message+ as the default messenger and for most people who buy prepaid, they don’t bother to change anything on their phones. That said, postpaid users definitely use it too. I’d say the biggest reason is for the text message backup – there aren’t a ton of reliable ways to back up text messages and message+ tells you it does this, making it feel like a better option for people who don’t mind the horrible dated UI and overall bugginess.
A little embarrassed to say that I use message+, but the text message backup is absolutely the main reason i use it. I also rarely text anymore. Most of my communication is via Whatsapp these days.
Hell has started to freeze.
It will be completely frozen if apple adopts RCS.
But of course, they wont, because they will never get pressured by a carrier or their rabid cult followers.
Why would they though? They know iMessage keeps a chunk of people loyal to them. It would just be a bad business model to sacrifice that loyalty.
There’s really no reason for Apple to adopt RCS until SMS is EOL’d.
While both iMessage & RCS will be E2EE separately, they won’t be when talking to each other.
The difference is that RCS is meant to be a universal standard, where iMessage is proprietary. Considering Apple’s obsession with locking customers into their ecosystem, like paying fines instead of changing to a universal charging connector, this isn’t a surprise.
The GSMA was supposed to have the power to do this, as a requirement for 5G is RCS support.
This is the last battle. Google hasn’t “won” anything with RCS until the fruit company integrates with RCS.
Google should just release the app on iOS. I’d install it to tak to like three people.
Google can’t – apple doesn’t allow any 3rd party apps to handle SMS communications.
Sounds like a good excuse to accuse them of abuse of monopoly power.
Now the last thing is to not allow iPhones to use 5G until they allow RCS
You forget that Apple tells the US carriers what to do, not the other way around.