Here’s How Green Bubbles Are Upgraded in iOS 18

Green bubbles, rejoice: Your iPhone friends are finally going to be able to text you more easily. As part of iOS 18, which was released to everyone on Monday, Apple added support for RCS, the Rich Communication Services protocol for messaging. That means conversations between iPhone and Android users will finally have a bunch of much-needed features that should have been in place a long time ago.

One of the main reasons I’ve stuck with iOS (and haven’t even considered switching to Android) is that iMessage conversations work particularly well for my family’s group chats, and I don’t want to weaken those chats. This new RCS support is a big step toward making iPhone-to-Android texting work a lot better (though there are still enough drawbacks that I plan to stick with iOS).

With RCS on iOS, you’ll get major improvements like high-resolution media, typing indicators, and delivery receipts when texting with people on other phones that also support RCS. In its iOS 18 press release, Apple also highlights support for “more reliable group messaging than SMS and MMS.”

RCS conversations still lack many of the features that Apple has built into iMessage conversations, like the ability to schedule messages to send later or add animated text effects to what you’re writing. But with RCS support, many of the basic features are now available.

When you’re texting someone who isn’t on an iPhone, take a look at the text input box. In gray letters, you’ll see the words “SMS,” followed by a period, and then “RCS” or “SMS.” If you see RCS, you’re in an RCS conversation! You may see similar “RCS” or “SMS” indicators in the middle of a conversation thread.

There may be at least one catch, though: it seems that not all carriers support RCS on iPhone yet. While, according to 9to5GoogleAT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon all support this feature in the US, I’m on Mint Mobile and instead of saying “RCS” my iPhone to Android conversations still say “SMS”. At least I have nice Tapbacks, which are available via SMS. But overall, SMS conversations haven’t changed, so if you’re forced to chat with your Android friends via SMS, you’ll have to deal with the limitations that have been in place for years.

If for some reason you wish to disable RCS, you can do so from Settings > Apps > Messages > RCS Messaging.

Apple only supports the basic RCS standard, called RCS Universal Profile, which doesn’t have cross-platform end-to-end encryption. That means if you text a friend who uses Google Messages, those messages won’t be encrypted like they are if you text another iPhone user via iMessage.

While disappointing, this isn’t really surprising. Apple would probably prefer that everyone buy an iPhone. And the GSMA announced today that it wants to add interoperable end-to-end encryption to the RCS Universal Profile, so that iPhone users who text their Android friends will be able to benefit from end-to-end encryption in the not-too-distant future.

Correction of September 17:A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that encryption over RCS was available on iOS 18. The RCS Universal Profile implemented by Apple uses encryption, but it does not support end-to-end encryption between iOS and Android.