Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR Google devs appear to be considering implementing some changes to how Messages displays link previews.
Previews could drop the full URL, and might start omitting page descriptions.
Messages may start coloring its previews to match page graphics.
What do you think about before clicking on a link? Are you the sort of user who scrutinizes the URL, looking for any info that may help clarify what sort of content awaits on the other end? Do you just blindly click through without thinking twice? Or have you gotten used to apps that offer a bit of a preview, summarizing where the link goes with a headline and maybe even image teaser? Today we’re looking at that kind of preview action in one particular app, as we spot some in-development changes to how Google Messages handles link sharing.
Let’s start by taking a look at how link previews already work in Messages. Whether you send someone just a plain link, or a link plus some accompanying text, Messages attempts to pull the page title, a primary graphic, page description, and finally lists the hosting site.
AssembleDebug / Android Authority
There’s a lot to like about that reasonably thorough approach to handling links, but in Google Messages version messages.android_20250922_00_RC00.phone.openbeta_dynamic, we’ve been able to get the app to give us an early preview of a not-yet-used alternative style for these previews.
The first thing we notice is a change to how Messages handles including the text URL. In the screen on the left here, we sent two messages, just like in our first example. But for the one that was a URL alone, with no accompanying text, Messages no longer displays the link, and only shows the preview. If you do include some additional text, as we see beneath, both the text and the full URL are still included.
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