Google Fi Texting Features and Benefits

Google Fi's texting features are a game-changer for anyone who wants a seamless and reliable messaging experience.

With Google Fi, you can send and receive texts from anywhere in the world, including over 200 countries and territories, without incurring additional international charges.

You can also use your phone's cellular data to send and receive texts, even when you don't have a signal, which is super convenient when you're traveling or in areas with poor coverage.

Google Fi users who rely on Hangouts for texting may have experienced issues with missing messages. Between March 31st and April 5th, a service interruption caused some text messages to go missing.

Google has informed affected users that the issue is now resolved, and delayed messages should appear in Hangouts by the end of April 7th. The company is still working to patch through the delayed messages.

Google has disabled texting from Hangouts for Fi users, and SMS messages will now be delivered to Messages by Google or another default messaging app.

A server failure at Syniverse, a firm that routes text messages between carriers, caused a similar issue in November 2019, where over 168,000 messages were delivered nine months late.

Google Fi is bringing a serious update to its network by adding Rich Communication Services (RCS) to its Messages app.

RCS is a big advancement over standard SMS texting, letting you use read receipts, see when someone else is typing, text over Wi-Fi, and send higher-resolution pictures and video.

The RCS update is rolling out starting January 14 and "in the coming weeks", according to Google.

Phones designed for Fi, like the Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL, will be automatically updated with RCS enabled.

You'll also be able to use RCS on a larger list of Fi-compatible phones, but you'll have to download the Messages app and set it as your default messaging app.

To test if RCS is enabled, just spark up a conversation with someone through the Messages app, and if they're on a compatible phone and network, the text field at the bottom of your message thread will say "Chat message" instead of "Text message."

If you're using Hangouts as your SMS client, you'll need to disable Hangouts integration before you can use RCS in the Messages app.

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Google Fi users will soon lose the ability to route text conversations through Hangouts.

Google recommends that Fi users who want to sync their text conversations across multiple devices use Messages for Web instead.

Fi users can send and receive texts even without a direct connection to their phone, but RCS will need to be disabled first.

To replicate the experience on the desktop, users will be expected to use Messages for Web.

Users can associate their Google account to Messages for Web, allowing them to send and receive texts without a direct connection to their phone.

To establish a connection between their phone and computer, users can scan a QR code on the Messages for Web site.

This connection allows you to send and receive messages on your computer, including RCS-enabled chat features like high-res images and read receipts.

To enable offline syncing, you'll need to disable chat features due to the encrypted nature of RCS.

Here's a quick rundown of the changes: