There’s an emerging player in the world of business text messaging. For a while now, the dominating forms of messaging have been SMS and MMS. SMS stands for “short message service” and is the standard form of text-only messages, while MMS stands for “multimedia message service” and builds on that with images, videos, and more. Now, though, we’re seeing the rise of RCS or “rich communication services.” In this blog, we dive into what RCS is and how it’s changing the game!
Table of Contents
- What RCS Messaging Is
- Key Benefits and Example Applications
- The Growth of RCS
- Looking Forward with RCS and TextP2P
- Conclusion
What RCS Messaging Is
RCS is an advanced messaging protocol that affects and enhances many parts of the messaging experience. It isn’t just one specific feature, but rather a set of several. Between Google’s and Apple’s RCS messaging, for example, you can:
- Share photos, videos, and links
- Know when someone is typing
- Get delivery and read receipts
- Message using cellular data and WiFi
- Edit yourself in group chats
- Secure conversations with end-to-end encryption
- See suggested replies and actions
There are some differences between Google and Apple — for example, Google’s RCS is encrypted but Apple’s is not — but the list above should give you an idea of what’s possible. RCS increases the potential of messaging and goes beyond what SMS and MMS can do. Here are some key differences between the services:
| RCS | MMS | SMS | |
| Multimedia support | High-resolution photos and videos with a size limit of 100 MB | Photos and videos with a size limit of 5 MB | Not supported, only text allowed |
| Interactive elements | Links, scrollable carousels, quick replies, CTA buttons, and more | Standard text chat features | Standard text chat features |
| Group messaging capabilities | Advanced — adding, removing, and renaming groups and people | Basic | Basic |
| Message size | No limit | 1600 characters | 160 characters |
| Delivery receipts | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Read receipts | Yes | No | No |
| Typing indicators | Yes | No | No |
| Custom branding | Yes | No | No |
| Sent via | WiFi or cellular data | Cellular network | Cellular network |
| End-to-end encryption | In some cases | Never | Never |
So as you can see, there’s a lot you can do with RCS. But we’ve only scraped the surface, so now let’s dive deeper into some key features and applications!
Key Benefits and Example Applications
Better branding
With RCS, you can have a professional business profile that includes your name, logo, and colors — as well as a banner and description! This allows you to stand out and build trust. For customers, gone are the days of receiving messages from numbers you don’t know.
Additionally, you can also appear with a verification badge, to build even more trust. Now, there will be no suspicion of scam, and customers will know that you are verified by Google! The process for getting verified is rigorous, but that is only to make sure that you really are who you say you are.
Branded messaging is applicable to all sorts of businesses, from non-profits to realtors to gyms!
Increased interactivity
Embedded buttons, carousels, mobile tickets, forms, links, and more all add to the messaging experience and open up a world of possibilities. After all, a big part of RCS messaging is the rich content.
The buttons in particular can be very advantageous because interactive messaging has been shown to improve customer engagement rates by 30 to 40%. The general idea is “tap, don’t type.” For example, a button could be used to confirm an appointment. Instead of typing C to confirm, all a customer has to do is click the button! For more on appointment reminders, also check out this blog post and this webpage.
Other examples of interactive content include a product catalog carousel and an order confirmation.
Enhanced analytics
RCS allows businesses to see detailed delivery and read receipts. SMS already includes delivery receipts, but they are somewhat unreliable because of their variability across different channels, countries, and carriers. RCS, on the other hand, will be much more consistent. RCS also brings with it the new resource of read receipts.
Overall, then, you are able to gain a more full understanding of how well your messages are doing. You can see the whole journey of your message! Again, this is something applicable to various types of businesses.
More space to send
RCS messages have no character limit, which means you’re able to send messages as long as you like, without worrying about segmentation. However, since RCS is still developing, there have been some bugs with message truncation. Nonetheless, the potential is there. As another benefit, though, RCS gives businesses more space to send larger images and videos.
This is helpful for all sorts of businesses, with one example being retail ones. Images can be used to send coupons, videos can be used to send product demos, and longer messages can be used to advertise sales. To learn more about how text messaging can help retail businesses, be sure to check out this blog post!
Now that we’ve looked extensively at what RCS is, let’s discuss its history and why now is the time to talk about it.
The Growth of RCS
RCS was first proposed in 2007, and in 2008, the GSMA (Groupe Spécial Mobile Association) became its home by creating an RCS steering committee. The GSMA is a global trade group representing more than 750 mobile phone operators. They have since created a standard set of features for mobile operators to implement, as well as resources, FAQs, and more to provide info about RCS.
RCS was slow to catch on, though, being overshadowed by over-the-top (OTT) messaging. OTT is a type of messaging that runs over the internet through apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. It took ten years for RCS to really take off, with Google ultimately helping the acceleration — first with the acquisition of RCS provider Jibe Mobile in 2015, and then with the integration of RCS into its Android messages in 2016. By 2018, RCS was supported by more than 50 launched or announced networks. (RCS support is determined by carrier.)
On September 16 this year, Apple released its own integration of RCS in iOS 18.0. The Messages app now supports RCS when messaging contacts who don’t have an Apple device. This is significant as Apple holds a majority of the U.S. smartphone market share — over 57% as of September — but still has to work with other companies. Samsung has about a 23% share and Google has a 5% share, so Apple users should be able to work with Samsung and Google users. RCS in iOS 18.0 helps with this.
This type of RCS — the kind that bridges the gap between Apple and other users — is called RCS P2P messaging, where P2P stands for peer-to-peer. Additionally, there is also RCS A2P messaging, where A2P stands for application-to-peer. Apple also supports A2P now with the release of iOS 18.1 on October 28. 18.2 is set to launch next month, and with it users will be able to change their default messaging app. So, we might see a shift away from RCS in iMessage and towards OTT in WhatsApp and Messenger. However, the situation is uncertain right now, and as Zak Doffman of Forbes put it, “Millions of iPhone users—especially those in the US with a particular affinity to blue bubbles—have a decision to make.”
For now though, Apple’s adoption of RCS is significant in bringing together the market as a whole. As we saw with Google, having a big company like this lean into RCS drives others to accept it too.
Looking Forward with RCS and TextP2P
All in all, the growth of RCS is very exciting. For a carrier-led / carrier-dependent service, it is moving faster than really anything in the past 20 years. And, it’s moving into TextP2P too! We’re happy to announce that RCS is coming to TextP2P in the near future! It is currently in a beta stage and will be out soon. In the meantime, be sure to stay updated with our social media and blog!
Conclusion
Overall, RCS is changing the game for the better. Adoption is expanding, and messaging is becoming a more feature-full experience. For now, continue to keep a look out for TextP2P’s official RCS release and thank you for reading!
