RCS issues sweep across Pixel and Samsung phones, but you can try these potential workarounds

It seems like over the past week or so, several Pixel and Samsung phone users have noticed issues with RCS messaging. The problem is causing frustration as many users find themselves unable to send or receive RCS messages.

Reports indicate that the issue is affecting users across multiple carriers, including Verizon and T-Mobile in the US. Symptoms range from messages failing to send, to RCS being completely unavailable on devices that previously supported it.

One Reddit user described their experience: “Today for some reason half my chats suddenly didn’t work, saying that ‘Your carrier doesn’t support messaging with <friend names>’. When I tried to look at my RCS chat settings it said ‘RCS chats aren’t available for this device. Your device does not currently support this feature.'”

The cause of the widespread outage remains unclear. Some users speculate it might be related to recent changes made to accommodate Apple’s adoption of RCS, while others believe it could be a server-side issue with Google’s Jibe platform, which many carriers use to provide RCS functionality.

While an official fix has yet to be released, several users have reported success with various workarounds. Here’s a potential solution that has worked for many:

1. Enable Airplane Mode
2. Go to Settings > Apps
3. Select Carrier Services > Storage (if available on your device)
4. Clear cache and data
5. Force stop the app
6. In the Apps list, select Google Messages > Storage
7. Clear cache and data
8. Force stop the app
9. Disable Airplane Mode
10. Open Messages and log back into your Google Account

It’s important to note that while this process clears app data, it typically doesn’t delete your message history. However, it’s always wise to back up your data before attempting any troubleshooting steps. Judging by the responses to this workaround, it seems like many users were able to get back to using RCS messaging right after performing these steps.

For users who don’t have the Carrier Services app, simply clearing the cache and data for the Google Messages app and restarting the phone has worked in some cases. If these steps don’t resolve the issue, some users have found success by uninstalling and reinstalling the Google Messages app.

It’s unclear if we’ll see an official acknowledgment from any carrier or even Google regarding the issue. So you might want to give these few potential workarounds a shot. Do let us know if they helped get RCS working again or not in the comments section below. If you’re still experiencing issues after attempting these fixes, it may be worth contacting your carrier’s support team for further assistance.