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RCS in iOS 18: What You Need to Know About Apple's Android Messaging Overhaul

jahutch2 said:
Used to have an Android and yes it’s horrific. Without RCS every tag shows up as separate text e.g. “Johnny liked a photo” instead of a thumbs up showing up next to the message. Photos and video are low quality. And everything is insecure clear text for the *whole group.*

For folks who use WhatsApp etc there will be no change so I dont understand the complaint. Personally something like 90% of my friends and family mainly use built in messaging and 80% use that exclusively. This varies by group but I know almost no one who uses WhatsApp and none who use telegram. And if they do they all like something different so fall back to built in messaging anyway. I do know outside the US third party apps are far more popular (WhatsApp in Europe, WeChat in China, etc) so this will be less important but in the US it’s huge in my opinion unless you only communicate with iPhone users.
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I am not sure how Apple Messages works now if you start a group text with iPhones and Android phones. I'm guessing it forces everyone to MMS correct? I am sure if you do the same with RCS it'll force everyone to RCS in a mixed group situation, but that would be a huge improvement and make mixed groups behave a lot more like iMessage only groups.

I have an Android phone and have a few small groups that include iPhones and in Google Messages it just shows everything as MMS. It used to be a real pain until Google actually made reactions work properly by cheating the antiquated protocol so they show up as reactions and not text. Still image and video sharing in those group texts are terrible and limited.
 
RCS is a good move forward, SMS is years old I used that on my 2G phones from Nokia just after digital phones came in, yes I used to use analogue mobiles with no features just calls and they cracked like hell like hell to users at the other end but you got a signal anywhere, but digital phones came out with improved voice quality and if you moved two feet you had no signal for ages it was was awful until they put more masts up and converted old ones, after all in the UK the cellular phone network was designed for cars not people. Orange made the first mobile phones for people and changed the landscape they brought in SMS, with credit card sized sim cards in their Motorola phones limited to 160 digits. All things move forward and this is a good move, it seems you spend to much time tilting at windmills.
 
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Does this mean that the marketing SMS texts I receive occasionally will be loud autoplay videos and that the spammer will receive notifications that their spam reached destination?

I hope Apple will include some settings to turn these things off...
 
Paddle1 said:
Other than that the short character limit and degraded media quality are reason enough, plus the ability to send messages over Wi-Fi when you have no signal.
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I don't care either way about RCS adoption (or green vs blue bubbles, for that matter). But I just wanted to point out that, in the US at least, all the major carriers have already offered wifi-to-cell gateways for many years. I can already send SMS messages from the basement of my office building.
 
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Quick question:
Here in the UK if I want to send a photo to an Android phone, it gets sent as a MMS message and this costs around 55 pence per message.

I was wondering when RCS is implemented, would sending the same thing, would it just be like when I send a photo in an iMessage, i.e. it just uses data and does not incur the MMS 55 pence charge?
 
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Very nice. 👌

Now go away and don’t come back until this supports end-to-end encryption across multiple (ie different) devices. 🙂
 
Fatboy71 said:
Here in the UK if I want to send a photo to an Android phone, it gets sent as a MMS message and this costs around 55 pence per message.
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Slightly off topic in case you want to save some bucks (* pounds):
If you have iCloud enabled for photos (or consider it), you can select a photo, tap the 'share' icon and select 'Copy iCloud Link'.
Now you can send that link to any Android users via SMS for free (assuming flat rate) and they can view the photo in full quality by tapping the link (opens in a browser window). Links expire after 30 days.

Share photos and videos with an iCloud Link on iCloud.com

On iCloud.com, share photos and videos stored in iCloud Photos with an iCloud Link.
support.apple.com

Westside guy said:
in the US at least, all the major carriers have already offered wifi-to-cell gateways for many years. I can already send SMS messages from the basement of my office building.
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Same in Europe. At least since iOS 16 the basebands have been updated in corporation with most remaining carriers to support sending/receiving SMS via wifi-calling.
 
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I guess it's a local Bulgarian thing (and I guess many of you don't even know where Bulgaria is on the map 😀) but here a messenger called Viber is very popular and even some big companies use it to avoid SMS charges and sending their messages through Viber, such as e.g. delivery companies sending delivery status updates, banks sending statements and transaction notifications, etc. It's very bloated app that I hate but is still much better than WhatsApp and has been offering end-to-end encryption and edit/delete of sent messages for ages. Not sure if it's popular outside Bulgaria though...
 
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CyberGene said:
I guess it's a local Bulgarian thing (and I guess many of you don't even know where Bulgaria is on the map 😀) but here a messenger called Viber is very popular and even some big companies use it to avoid SMS charges and sending their messages through Viber, such as e.g. delivery companies sending delivery status updates, banks sending statements and transaction notifications, etc. It's very bloated app that I hate but is still much better than WhatsApp and has been offering end-to-end encryption and edit/delete of sent messages for ages. Not sure if it's popular outside Bulgaria though...
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Your neighbor here, Viber is popular here too and it's used by businesses. There is a dedicated Viber section for commercial messages.
 
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Mr Todhunter said:
Who is your service provider in Sweden"?
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I'm on Hallon, which admittedly is a budget carrier and subsidy of Tre (Three Sweden). But it's hard to find information about RCS from Swedish carriers in general. Google's implementation is not the same as network RCS that Apple seems to be planning to use. Google's version works like iMessage, and works with any data connection, while RCS from the GSM Association will be more akin to SMS/MMS from the provider's point of view. Almost all info I find though mentions only Google's variant.
 
Rychiar said:
sms is trash when your cellular connection sucks. I can barely message droid users from my house. Looking forward to this greatly
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Put your phone in airplane mode when you have poor cell signal. I do this at home and never have issues messaging Android numbers because it's forced to go over WiFi.

Edit: A downvote? This works. It doesn't work on every WiFi network and every carrier in the world (e.g., on a cruise), but it works in the United States, Canada, and as far as I know most major cell carriers in the world.
 
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neuropsychguy said:
Put your phone in airplane mode when you have poor cell signal. I do this at home and never have issues messaging Android numbers because it's forced to go over WiFi.
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How? SMS only works over cellular. I was just on a cruise and my phone was in airplane mode the whole time and android people could only communicate via Facebook messenger cus I don’t think many actually even have rcs yet
 
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Rychiar said:
How? SMS only works over cellular. I was just on a cruise and my phone was in airplane mode the whole time and android people could only communicate via Facebook messenger cus I don’t think many actually even have rcs yet
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Can't test it right now, but as far as I know, SMS can also go over the Internet using 'Wifi Call'.
 
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Once upon a time, Apple Execs floated the idea to make iMessage interoperable and release it as an open standard. I guess that boat has sailed long time ago. Now they have to implement RCS. How times (and Apple) have changed.
 
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neuropsychguy said:
Put your phone in airplane mode when you have poor cell signal. I do this at home and never have issues messaging Android numbers because it's forced to go over WiFi.
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No. SMS is not going through WiFi (or internet in general). Calls can. SMS can not. I'm talking about pure SMS, not iMessage nor Whatsapp nor RCS. So putting your phone on airplane mode definitely does not send SMS.
 
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hacky said:
No. SMS is not going through WiFi (or internet in general). Calls can. SMS can not. I'm talking about pure SMS, not iMessage nor Whatsapp nor RCS. So putting your phone on airplane mode definitely does not send SMS.
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At least some operators support sending SMS and even MMS over the Internet when 'Wifi Call' is activated. Can't test it right now, just quoting from support docs of T-Mobile Germany.
 
Rychiar said:
How? SMS only works over cellular. I was just on a cruise and my phone was in airplane mode the whole time and android people could only communicate via Facebook messenger cus I don’t think many actually even have rcs yet
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I know some networks allows calling over wifi, I wonder if that extends to texting as well?
 
hacky said:
No. SMS is not going through WiFi (or internet in general). Calls can. SMS can not.
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This is not true. Perhaps a particular country/carrier did not adopt this technology yet but it exists for years and is fairly mainstream nowadays. At least in the US and Europe.
One can verify if their iPhone/carrier technically supports it by taping on "Settings > About > Network Provider" which then switches to "IMS Status".
IMG_C85426430599-1.jpeg

It is only available if "Settings > Phone > Calls > Wi-Fi Calling" is set to "On".
(US AT&T says to enable "Wi-Fi Calling" in "Settings > Cellular")

neuropsychguy said:
Put your phone in airplane mode when you have poor cell signal. I do this at home and never have issues messaging Android numbers because it's forced to go over WiFi.
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Ditto. I don't understand why you got downvoted. Perhaps it was not clear that Wi-Fi must be connected…
MilaM said:
At least some operators support sending SMS and even MMS over the Internet when 'Wifi Call' is activated. Can't test it right now, just quoting from support docs of T-Mobile Germany.
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Correct. In June 2022 o2 (Telefonica) was the last big carrier in Germany to adopt SMS via wifi-calling. It required iOS 16 for iPhones for the baseband / carrier profile to be updated.
For (most) US carriers it is common for a long time.
boss.king said:
I know some networks allows calling over wifi, I wonder if that extends to texting as well?
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It does. If all requirements are met (carrier/router/phone/OS).
(I can only speculate that wifi hotspots like on cruise ships, airplanes and trains lack the necessary protocol or agreements with all necessary providers.)
 
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