In March, Apple said that it planned to add support for end-to-end encrypted RCS messages to the Messages app in future iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and watchOS software updates, and we are still waiting for that to happen. As of the third developer beta of iOS 26 released this week, the upgrade has yet to be implemented on iPhones.
End-to-end encryption for RCS was announced in March, as part of version 3.0 of the RCS Universal Profile, a global standard for RCS features and specifications. This means that Apple has indirectly confirmed that it will support RCS Universal Profile 3.0, which includes not only end-to-end encryption for RCS, but several other iMessage-like enhancements for RCS that were originally introduced in RCS Universal Profile 2.7.
Apple has to wait on carriers to implement RCS Universal Profile 3.0 too, so it is understandable why the process is taking time.
Here are five new capabilities to expect for RCS conversations on the iPhone, iPad, and Mac, once Apple rolls out support for RCS Universal Profile 3.0:
- End-to-end encryption, which will prevent Apple and any other third party from being able to read messages and attachments while they are being sent between devices, as has always been the case with iMessage
- In-line replies
- Edit messages
- Unsend messages
- Full-fledged Tapback support for RCS messages, with no special workarounds
RCS support as a whole was added to the iPhone with iOS 18, which supports RCS Universal Profile 2.4. It is effectively a modernized version of the SMS standard, which remains available as a fallback option for text messages over a cellular network.
RCS will be playing catch up with iMessage in many ways. iMessage conversations with blue bubbles have already supported end-to-end encryption by default since iOS 5. In addition, iMessage has supported in-line replies since iOS 14, while the options to edit and unsend iMessages were introduced with iOS 16.
It seems likely that Apple will roll out these RCS upgrades at some point during the iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS 26, and watchOS 26 software cycle.
