As someone who uses WhatsApp for family communication and sundry, I simply don’t care about RCS. I can absolutely appreciate its benefits and why many of our readers use it, but my circumstances simply don’t require it. What I do need is a capable SMS app for one-time PINs, company correspondence, and emergency communication. It’s safe to say then that Google Messages is overkill for my needs. But the reason I recently started looking for an alternative Android messaging app isn’t its sheer breadth of features, but rather one it was sorely lacking.
Google Messages’ spam blocking is far too rigid. In my experience, it often marks messages from my carrier and bank as spam, but will happily allow actual scam texts to stroll onto my device. The feature has no toggles, allows no user refinement or customization, and does what it believes is best on my phone. Giving it the wheel simply doesn’t work for me anymore; I want agency.