The biggest updates coming to Apple’s iMessage and Messages app in iOS 18 aren’t AI emoji, Genmoji, or even the ability to send messages via satellite. It is the skill after all, after all schedule messages to be sent at a later date and time, and support RCSthe next generation messaging standard and SMS replacement that will make texting with Android users much less painful.
Although buried among a slew of AI announcements and other UI tweaks at WWDC 2024, these messaging features will have a significant impact on how people communicate every day.
For years, consumer demand for message scheduling led developers to create complicated and cumbersome workarounds, such as apps that remind you via push notifications to send a text, for example, or workarounds that only worked on jailbrowned iPhones. The new iOS will offer the ability to schedule your messages to be sent later as a built-in functionality.
The feature only received a brief mention at WWDC. At Apple Press release, announced in the same proposal as the Tapbacks upgrade, which was expanded to include support for any emoji or sticker in iOS 18. Clearly, Apple doesn’t think Send Later is a feature worth spending much time on. But for anyone who runs a business from their iPhone — or people who only remember the important things they need to text while lying in bed at 3 a.m. – the new scheduling feature will be a very welcome addition. Beyond just making life easier, like when you want to message someone across time zones without disturbing them, Apple’s screenshot suggests you can also use the feature to make sure you don’t miss sending someone a greeting birthday.
But even more important is the Messages app’s support for RCS, the messaging standard and replacement for SMS that will address many of the complaints of texting those Android users with a green bubble.
For a long time, Google has been urging and campaigning for Apple to adopt the standard, which would improve the communication experience between Android and iOS users. The Wall Street Journal ran a report on the race for the green bubbles and how the blue bubbles is essential for US teenagers. While EU regulators ultimately decided that iMessage wasn’t popular enough to be forced to open up and become interoperable with other messaging services, the added scrutiny likely influenced Apple’s decision here — as did The interest of American congressmen to Apple’s shutdown of Beeper, a third-party app that brought iMessage to Android users.
Due to Apple’s long-standing refusal to add support for RCS, messaging with Android users meant no typing or read receipts, broken group chats, and blurry photos and videos. It also means that messages won’t be end-to-end encrypted like they were in iMessage.
Unfortunately for Android users, messages sent via RCS won’t get rid of the green bubble curse on Apple devices according to screenshots on its website, which show the feature in action. Instead, the text box indicates in light gray font that your texts with someone support both “Text Message + RCS”, while the texts themselves are still green.
However, the issues that make the Messages app a broken experience for Apple customers will apparently be addressed, as Apple says it will support the standard later this year. The news, of course, only got a brief mention in Apple’s press release, where it noted that RCS would allow for “richer media and more reliable group messaging compared to SMS and MMS.”
Earlier reports cited Apple intends to work with the GSMA to add support for end-to-end encryption to the Universal Profile for RCS, but will not support E2EE out of the gate. This is likely why there was no mention of encrypted messages in Apple’s RCS announcement.
