Apple announced its plans to bring RCS messaging to the iPhone in November 2023. Fast forward to WWDC 2024, and the company confirmed it’s adding support for RCS messaging with the upcoming iOS 18.
While iOS 18 is set to arrive sometime in the fall, if you can’t wait until then, there’s a workaround you can follow to try RCS messaging on your iPhone right now. It requires you to be on a supported carrier network and install the iOS 18 developer beta 2 or later on your iPhone.
Keep reading, and we’ll explain what RCS messaging is and how to enable it on your iPhone in iOS 18.
What is RCS messaging?
RCS or Rich Communication Services is a messaging protocol aimed at offering an interactive and engaging messaging experience to users. It’s meant to be replacement for SMS and offers features similar to Apple’s iMessage, such as read receipts, high-resolution multimedia sharing, emoji reactions, audio messages, and more.
RCS’s biggest advantage is bridging the gap between Android and iPhone users. The best part is that it’s native to both Android and iOS, so you don’t need to install any third-party app to chat with your contacts over RCS. Even better, RCS messaging uses a data or Wi-Fi connection to send and receive messages.
Which iPhones (and carriers) support RCS messaging?
Ideally, all iPhones running on iOS 18 will support RCS messaging. However, whether or not you’ll be able to use RCS messaging on yours depends entirely upon your carrier.
Below, we’ve curated a list of the iPhones and the carriers in the U.S., Europe, UK, and Canada that support RCS.
RCS-compatible iPhones:
- iPhone SE 2 and 3
- iPhone XR
- iPhone XS and XS Max
- iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhone 11 Pro Max
- iPhone 12, iPhone 12 Mini, iPhone 12 Pro, iPhone 12 Pro Max
- iPhone 13, iPhone 13 Mini, iPhone 13 Pro, iPhone 13 Pro Max
- iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Plus, iPhone 14 Pro, iPhone 14 Pro Max
- iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus, iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max
- Upcoming iPhone 16 series
RCS-compatible carriers:
- U.S.: AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon
- Canada: Videotron, Telus Mobility, Bell, Fido, and Rogers
- Germany: O2
- Spain: Telefonica, Orange, Vodafone, and Yoigo
- France: SFR
- UK: Orange and T-Mobile
How to set up RCS messaging on an iPhone
To set up and use RCS messaging on an iPhone, you must first update it to iOS 18. You can currently do this by installing the latest iOS 18 developer beta, as shown in the following steps:
- Open beta.apple.com in a web browser and tap Sign Up.
- Fill in your email address or phone number linked to your Apple account, followed by your password, and sign in.
- Once you’ve signed in, accept the terms and conditions and select Beta Updates.
- Next, open Settings on your iPhone and go to General → Software Update → Beta Updates → iOS 18 Developer Beta.
- Tap Download & Install to begin installing the beta on your iPhone.
Your iPhone may restart a few times during the installation process. Just wait for it to finish, and you’ll have the iOS 18 developer beta running on your device when it boots up.
How to turn on RCS messaging on your iPhone in iOS 18
After you’ve installed the iOS 18 developer beta on your iPhone, you can turn on RCS messaging on it like this:
- Open Settings on your iPhone.
- Scroll down and tap Apps.
- Select Messages.
- Locate RCS Messaging under Text Messaging and toggle on the switch next to it.
Signing off…
If you’ve installed the latest iOS 18 developer beta on your iPhone and your carrier has enabled support for RCS on iPhones, you should be able to chat with your Android friends over RCS. However, if you can’t, it’s probably because your carrier hasn’t enabled RCS support for iPhones yet. You’ll have to wait a little more in this case to use RCS on your iPhone.
Do you think bringing RCS messaging to iPhones will end the blue versus green bubble debate finally? We’re all ears to hear from you.
If you’ve updated your iPhone to the latest iOS 18 and your carrier supports RCS messaging, you can troubleshoot by toggling RCS off and on and restarting your device. If the issues persist, try contacting your carrier.
You can disable RCS messaging by going into Settings → Apps → Messaging, and toggle off the RCS Messaging option.
No, you can’t schedule RCS messages from the iPhone. The Send Later feature on iOS is only available for iMessage, not SMS or RCS texts.
You can check your carrier’s website or contact customer service to confirm whether they support RCS messaging.
Yes, you can use both iMessage and RCS simultaneously. iMessage is used to communicate with other Apple users, while RCS is used to message Android users and other RCS-compatible devices.
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