RCS Issues

[Biro]

Is anyone else finding that RCS messaging is generally unreliable? I’ve had two people - both with RCS-enabled Android phones (one on Verizon and the other on AT&T) who have repeatedly sent me messages over the past few days. None made it through. Other times, both have gotten through fine.

Yes. Everyone has RCS activated on their devices and all carriers (T-Mobile for me) are RCS enabled. I am also having intermittent issues with messages arriving on my phone not synching with my iPads. I’m not sure if the issue is RCS, iOS 18, iCloud or all.

 

[BugeyeSTI]

Is anyone else finding that RCS messaging is generally unreliable? I’ve had two people - both with RCS-enabled Android phones (one on Verizon and the other on AT&T) who have repeatedly sent me messages over the past few days. None made it through. Other times, both have gotten through fine.

Yes. Everyone has RCS activated on their devices and all carriers (T-Mobile for me) are RCS enabled. I am also having intermittent issues with messages arriving on my phone not synching with my iPads. I’m not sure if the issue is RCS, iOS 18, iCloud or all.

I have had no issues with the one person I text with regularly using RCS. I have a few others that for some reason either don't know how to enable it on there Android phones or don't want to enable it. Honestly I don't text with them often enough for me to ask if it's enabled. Those contacts come as SMS

 

[Trash Can]

I have an issue when messaging my brother in group texts. I’m with Verizon on an iPhone running iOS 18. He’s with T-mobile on a Samsung phone. Ever since I enabled RCS, my phone would randomly show "Brian has left the conversation", which he did not do. Or it would randomly show "you removed Brian from the conversation", which I did not do. I would start another group chat including all of us. It would work fine for a day or two, then this weird behavior would start again. My solution was to turn off RCS and stick with SMS/MMS. This would only occur in a group message, individual RCS messages between us worked fine. My other brother and sister, who were in the group text with Android phones, were unaffected.

 

[Biro]

I have an issue when messaging my brother in group texts. I’m with Verizon on an iPhone running iOS 18. He’s with T-mobile on a Samsung phone. Ever since I enabled RCS, my phone would randomly show "Brian has left the conversation", which he did not do. Or it would randomly show "you removed Brian from the conversation", which I did not do. I would start another group chat including all of us. It would work fine for a day or two, then this weird behavior would start again. My solution was to turn off RCS and stick with SMS/MMS. This would only occur in a group message, individual RCS messages between us worked fine. My other brother and sister, who were in the group text with Android phones, were unaffected.

I just turned off RCS on my iPhone today. It’s clear that it’s just too buggy. Ironically, I upgraded to iOS 18 specifically for RCS. I wish I left it on 17.7. That’s where my wife’s devices are.

 

[Paddle1]

I haven't seen anything myself but I did see another forum member @TimFL1 say they were experiencing some bugs with RCS, and some other users saying similar in this RCS thread: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/rcs-supported-carriers.2429980/page-18

 

[TimFL1]

I have an issue when messaging my brother in group texts. I’m with Verizon on an iPhone running iOS 18. He’s with T-mobile on a Samsung phone. Ever since I enabled RCS, my phone would randomly show "Brian has left the conversation", which he did not do. Or it would randomly show "you removed Brian from the conversation", which I did not do. I would start another group chat including all of us. It would work fine for a day or two, then this weird behavior would start again. My solution was to turn off RCS and stick with SMS/MMS. This would only occur in a group message, individual RCS messages between us worked fine. My other brother and sister, who were in the group text with Android phones, were unaffected.

How many participants? If RCS goes offline for you, iOS reverts to MMS which usually has a cap of 6-10 users.

 

[MTShipp]

Similar boat. My son and a friend both on Android. Both on AT&T (me too). Messaging my son shows as RCS; my friend as SMS. I’ve been told by both they’ve sent messages separately to me that never arrived. And group messages to my son with wife and daughter, he does not see our iPhone side of messages most of the time.

I’m on 18.1 PB. Wife and daughter on 18.01.

 

[bigjnyc]

I only text with one Android user and so far RCS has worked flawlessly and stable.

I am on the 18.1 beta with verizon carrier

 

[Trash Can]

How many participants? If RCS goes offline for you, iOS reverts to MMS which usually has a cap of 6-10 users.

Between 3 and 5. Two of us are iPhone users, three are Android. It’s always the same person who randomly "leaves the conversation".

I only text with one Android user and so far RCS has worked flawlessly and stable.

I am on the 18.1 beta with verizon carrier

It worked flawlessly for me too just between the two of us. The issue I’m experiencing occurs when there‘s 3 or more people in the mix.

 

[bigjnyc]

Between 3 and 5. Two of us are iPhone users, three are Android. It’s always the same person who randomly "leaves the conversation".



It worked flawlessly for me too just between the two of us. The issue I’m experiencing occurs when there‘s 3 or more people in the mix.

Ah ok gotcha. Well it’s a good thing I only know one Android user then 🤣

 

[Trash Can]

So my woes continue.

Several days ago, I disabled RCS and was going to solely rely on SMS/MMS until these RCS bugs get sorted out. I was bored this morning, so I tinkered with a few things (reset network settings, iMessage off/on, turned off/on my line, re-enable RCS, and a force restart).

I wasn’t expecting much of anything, but a flood of RCS messages came in. These messages were part of an RCS group thread sent several days ago but only received today. In other words, the messages were stuck in "RCS purgatory". They did NOT revert to SMS/MMS while I had RCS disabled as I thought they were supposed to.

I don’t know what to do at this point. This whole thing is so frustrating.

EDIT: Does anyone know if Android automatically sends RCS messages as SMS/MMS if RCS is unavailable, like iOS does? Perhaps this is what caused the problem, as the senders mentioned above are Android types. No idea, just thinking out loud.

 

[TimFL1]

So my woes continue.

Several days ago, I disabled RCS and was going to solely rely on SMS/MMS until these RCS bugs get sorted out. I was bored this morning, so I tinkered with a few things (reset network settings, iMessage off/on, turned off/on my line, re-enable RCS, and a force restart).

I wasn’t expecting much of anything, but a flood of RCS messages came in. These messages were part of an RCS group thread sent several days ago but only received today. In other words, the messages were stuck in "RCS purgatory". They did NOT revert to SMS/MMS while I had RCS disabled as I thought they were supposed to.

I don’t know what to do at this point. This whole thing is so frustrating.

EDIT: Does anyone know if Android automatically sends RCS messages as SMS/MMS if RCS is unavailable, like iOS does? Perhaps this is what caused the problem, as the senders mentioned above are Android types. No idea, just thinking out loud.

That is how it‘s supposed to work for RCS groups. Android does it properly, never resending RCS group messages as MMS.

iOS is the odd one out that always reverts to MMS for RCS groups, when your RCS connection doesn‘t work.

Also, Android users can decide whether 1:1 RCS messages get resent as SMS/MMS if the recipient is offline. Overall a way better execution of RCS UP than iOS.

 

[lm2]

Is anyone else finding that RCS messaging is generally unreliable? I’ve had two people - both with RCS-enabled Android phones (one on Verizon and the other on AT&T) who have repeatedly sent me messages over the past few days. None made it through. Other times, both have gotten through fine.

Yes. Everyone has RCS activated on their devices and all carriers (T-Mobile for me) are RCS enabled. I am also having intermittent issues with messages arriving on my phone not synching with my iPads. I’m not sure if the issue is RCS, iOS 18, iCloud or all.

Honestly I think there are free internet-based much better messaging solutions (i think about xmpp or matrix), but im not sure it would be iphone-daily-user-compliant, even if I use it everyday...

 

[Trash Can]

That is how it‘s supposed to work for RCS groups. Android does it properly, never resending RCS group messages as MMS.

iOS is the odd one out that always reverts to MMS for RCS groups, when your RCS connection doesn‘t work.

Also, Android users can decide whether 1:1 RCS messages get resent as SMS/MMS if the recipient is offline. Overall a way better execution of RCS UP than iOS.

Thank you for the info. I’m glad I’m not totally losing my mind.

 

[MakaniKai]

My RCS is very glitchy. Whenever replying to my Android friends in a group chat, my messages come across in a completely new conversation. So it looks like I’m just talking to myself lol. If you look at their phones there’s like 10-15 conversations each with just a message or two from me.

 

[flybass]

Not great given this is one of the few reasons to upgrade to 18. Reminds me of the buggy SharePlay in car feature..

 

[raylo32]

This is a real PITA. Nothing but trouble. Most every message with photo I send to Android users fails. Then if I resend SMS it usually sends the text but not the photo. Then I have to click on the photo and try to send that SMS. And often when I do that even fails. Good grief.

 

[JuicyGoomba]

The worst part is that people will blame RCS for the issues, when in reality it's Apple's enforcement of carrier provided RCS (because for some reason they think that's better for privacy than routing through Google's servers).

RCS has been amazing for me on my Pixel over the years, switched to a 16 Plus and can't even get RCS as my carrier (O2 UK) don't want to pay for their own RCS servers. They already use Google's JIRA for Android RCS.

 

[raylo32]

I honestly don't know whom to blame. My carrier says it is supported, Apple says it is supported, but it just doesn't work. I also don't understand what the point of it is in the first place. I could send photos and videos and do group chats just fine with SMS. Now after I try send a photo I usually send another plain text that is the equivalent of "can you hear me (did you get the photo) now?" It is either that or wait for the !undelivered message to pop up.

The worst part is that people will blame RCS for the issues, when in reality it's Apple's enforcement of carrier provided RCS (because for some reason they think that's better for privacy than routing through Google's servers).

RCS has been amazing for me on my Pixel over the years, switched to a 16 Plus and can't even get RCS as my carrier (O2 UK) don't want to pay for their own RCS servers. They already use Google's JIRA for Android RCS.