Through the Android Present main as much as Google I/O, Google on Tuesday provided a quick replace on the adoption of the RCS (Wealthy Communication Providers) protocol, an improve to SMS that offers high-resolution images and movies, typing indicators, learn receipts, improved group chat, and extra. The corporate shared that the messaging customary now helps over a billion messages per day within the U.S.
This metric relies on a median of the final 28 days, Google famous.
The stat is notable as a result of Google fought for years to get Apple to undertake assist for RCS on iOS, permitting for higher communication between Android and Apple units. Beforehand, iPhone customers who acquired texts from buddies on Android needed to take care of blurry movies and pictures, and couldn’t as simply handle group chats when their green-bubbled buddies joined. Not like with iMessage, group chats with Android customers couldn’t be renamed, nor may folks be added or eliminated, and also you couldn’t exit once you wished. Emoji reactions additionally didn’t work correctly, resulting in annoying texts to let you know the way an Android person reacted, as an alternative of simply displaying their emoji response straight.
That modified with the autumn 2024 launch of iOS 18, when Apple lastly added RCS assist to its Messages app. Although the performance has been upgraded, Apple nonetheless shows RCS chats as inexperienced bubbles, hoping to maintain the stigma of being an Android person intact. That is particularly important among young people within the U.S., the place demand for the blue bubbles has cemented the iPhone as teenagers’ hottest system.
Surprisingly, Google didn’t share different stats round RCS, like these detailing the variety of customers extra particularly or the provider assist.