Texting from an iPhone to an Android phone is finally about to get a whole lot less dumb. After years of complaints from folks on both sides of the fence, Apple is finally bringing RCS to the iPhone. The more robust messaging standard will replace SMS when communicating with Android phones, allowing for more secure texts and higher-quality image and video sharing more akin to messaging between two iPhones. iPhones will continue to use a proprietary standard when messaging each other, though since that standard relies on an internet connection, they can also lean on RCS in situations where it's not available.

RCS even lets you send replies to Android phones, just like you can when you use iMessage to chat with another iPhone. Androids gained access to RCS when chatting with each other in 2019, and I was disappointed to lose this functionality when chatting with an iPhone.

The arrival of RCS on the iPhone is perhaps one of the biggest changes coming to the smartphone with iOS 18. That's because many have long been waiting for Apple to embrace the newer texting standard, with even the Department of Justice having weighed in on the situation in the past.

There are still caveats: RCS on the iPhone won’t completely eliminate the blue-bubble/green-bubble nonsense divide, since RCS messaging is still green in iOS. But it will hopefully help alleviate some concerns about how insecure regular SMS services are, while also giving iPhone and Android users options for richer communications.