Apple brings encrypted RCS chats to iPhone
7.2 relevance
Score Breakdown
technical depth 7
novelty 6
actionability 7
community 8
strategic 8
personal 9
Scored daily by a customisable AI persona to surface the most relevant engineering leadership news.
Apple's encrypted RCS is a direct, actionable feature for cross-platform communication, with high community and strategic interest.
Summary
Apple's iOS 26.5 beta introduces end-to-end encrypted RCS messaging between iPhone and Android users, indicated by a lock icon and 'Encrypted' label. The feature defaults on but requires carrier support and the latest Google Messages, with encryption rolling out automatically over time for new and existing chats.