Google Reportedly Testing Message Reactions to SMS From iPhone Users

Google recently launched a campaign last month titled #GetTheMessage that aimed to convince Apple to support Rich Communication Services (RCS) messaging on iPhones. According to a report Google’s efforts to improve messaging between Android and iPhone users are apparent with the latest feature being tested on the app. A Reddit user has spotted that the Google Messages app is testing the ability to react to messages sent from iPhones. When an Android user reacts to an SMS from an iPhone user, they will see a message showing an emoji was used to react to a message.

According to a report by Android Police, Google pulled an Apple. If you recall, iOS users can react to SMS messages, which send an SMS message back to the recipient (in this case an Android phone) which includes a message that specifies which reaction was used, along with the quoted message text, perceived by many users as annoying.

Google has already updated its Messages app to understand which message the reaction was for, and the app instead displays an emoji next to the message itself. With the new implementation, Google is now poking back at iPhone users, showing them a similar text-only version of a reaction to an SMS message, as per the report.

Reacting to messages with an emoji isn’t a novel concept. Plenty of cross-platform messaging apps including WhatsApp, Telegram, Messenger, Skype, Microsoft Teams, and Instagram come with support for reacting to messages or media with an emoji.

At this point, the only market where this really matters is iOS and Android users who live in the US, where many users prefer to use the phone’s default messaging experience. In Android’s case, that’s the default Google Messages app with RCS, while the Messages app is the default on the iPhone.