GoKawiilSanuj Bhatia / Android Authority
Google Messages has come a long way in the past couple of years. RCS is finally the default messaging protocol on most Android flagships, and small quality-of-life features like read receipts and typing indicators behave the way you’d expect.
The app finally feels like a worthy rival to iMessage, and texting between Android and iPhone no longer feels like the downgrade it once did. Samsung, in fact, believes Google Messages has gotten so good that it has even stopped preloading its own Messages app on Galaxy devices in favor of Google’s.
But spend enough time switching between the two, especially if you’re testing devices across both ecosystems, and the gaps start to show. I’ve had the chance to properly test iOS 27 through the recent beta releases, and now, ahead of its official debut in September alongside the new iPhone lineup, I can say with confidence that Google Messages still hasn’t nailed it.
Which iMessage feature do you want on Google Messages most? 11 votes Better multi-device sync 27 % Inline text formatting 9 % Message effects 36 % Partial text selection 27 %
I still can’t copy just part of a message on Google Messages
Sanuj Bhatia / Android Authority
This is one feature Google apparently started rolling out a few months ago, but I still don’t have it on my phone.
Right now, if someone sends me a long message with, say, an address or some other important information, and I only need to copy one part of it, I can’t. Google Messages only lets me copy the entire message.
My current workaround is to copy the whole message, tap the floating “Copied” notification, and then manually select and copy just the part I actually wanted. It works, but it’s far more cumbersome than it needs to be.
... continue reading