T-Mobile says Pixel 3a and Pixel 3 won’t support RCS messaging

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This is a big week for T-Mobile, because after years of urging customers to bring unlocked Pixel phones onto its network, T-Mo is officially launching Google Pixel phones. Unfortunately, there’s a little bad news for Pixel owners that’s come out with the launch.

Google’s new Pixel 3a and Pixel 3a XL won’t support RCS messaging on T-Mobile, T-Mo’s official support account has confirmed on Twitter. The tweet only says “the new Pixel devices” won’t support RCS, but Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL aren’t included in T-Mobile’s list of phones that support RCS either.

A T-Mobile spokesperson gave TmoNews the following statement on the matter:

“For wireless provider grade performance, T-Mobile’s advanced messaging RCS capabilities are built into the core of the network rather than individual apps or devices, and the Pixels currently do not support this network-level authentication.”

RCS messaging is a big improvement over standard text messaging, offering features like delivered and read receipts, typing indicators, support for larger file transfers, and more. Google offers RCS support in its Messages app, but T-Mobile will apparently not implement its RCS Universal Profile 1.0 support on the Pixel phones. Only a handful of T-Mo phones do currently have RCS support, like the Galaxy S7, S8 and S9 series of phones, the Note 8 and Note 9, and the OnePlus 6T.

Have you used RCS on one of the T-Mobile phones that support it?

Source: T-Mobile Help (Twitter)

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