But today’s announcement does indicate that SMS’s days are numbered and a better messaging future may be on the horizon.Mobile carriers in the United States will finally offer a universal cross-carrier communication standard for the next-generation RCS messaging service that is meant to replace SMS and has the potential to change the way consumers interact with brands for years to come.Īll major United States mobile phone carriers, including AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint, have joined forces to launch a new initiative that will replace SMS with RCS mobile messaging standard. The universal adoption of RCS is likely quite a while away.
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If iMessage loses its advantages, then Apple may have a stronger incentive to bring iMessage to Android, for example. Commentīut, like WhatsApp or other internet-based protocols, a universal RCS standard could go toe-to-toe with iMessage and put quite a bit of pressure on Apple. That’s likely because it already has iMessage, so its users may not benefit the same way Android users will. But that is, of course, dependent on whether or not Apple actually adopts it on its iPhones.Īpple, for its part, has offered no comment on the RCS standard. You may be familiar with the whole green bubble / blue bubble debacle.Ī universal RCS standard would essentially do away with the differences between Android and iMessage protocols.
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It’s not clear what this means for Apple, particularly since it’s very early in RCS’s potential adoption.īut, of course, there have long been problems with SMS text messages, particularly on iPhones. Lastly, the CCMI also positions RCS as a potential win for businesses, allowing customers to interact with brands and support staff much more easily than they would over SMS. Though, at this point, Google, Samsung and other OEMs haven’t commented. The CCMI will also work with device manufacturers to ensure that the messaging standard is interoperable across various smartphones and systems. While the CCMI has a long way to go, it did announce a new RCS-based Android app that will ship sometime next year. The joint venture’s main goal is to “create a single seamless, interoperable RCS experience across carriers, both in the U.S. What the Carriers Announced TodayĬCMI is, essentially, a coalition of the biggest carriers in the U.S. The bottlenecks associated with actually adopting the standard are likely why you may never have heard of it. (RCS is not currently end-to-end encrypted like iMessage is, however.)īut RCS is also extremely complicated, both technically and politically. Basically, everything that iMessage does and SMS doesn’t. If carriers actually do end up adopting RCS, it could mean better group chats, typing indicators and higher-quality images and videos, among other benefits.
![verizon att android messages rcs apple verizon att android messages rcs apple](https://m-cdn.phonearena.com/images/article/111670-wide-two_1600/Google-Pixel-3-and-Pixel-3-XL-are-getting-RCS-Chat-on-Verizon-starting-December-6.jpg)
SMS is an objectively terrible messaging standard, especially when compared to the aforementioned internet standards. In a nutshell, the RCS (Rich Communication Services) protocol will bring internet-based messaging features - like those seen on WhatsApp or iMessage - to standard text messages. That initiative focuses on the RCS messaging protocol - which could simultaneously replace SMS and put pressure on iMessage. The U.S.’s big four carriers announced a new partnership to push a next-generation messaging standard that could eventually replace SMS text messaging.ĪT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint announced the “Cross-Carrier Messaging Initiative” ( CCMI) in a joint press release on Friday.