Joe Maring / Android Authority
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TL;DR
- Google Messages is quietly rolling out the flexibility to set customized chat themes for traditional SMS conversations.
- Chat themes have been beforehand restricted to RCS chats within the messaging app.
- This transformation could have been facilitated by chat themes being restricted to the one that set it somewhat than everyone within the dialog.
Whereas Google Messages has lengthy let customers customise their RCS chats with a collection of colours, it bought a significant improve in August with the introduction of chat themes, a function we first uncovered in Might. One key limitation of this customization software is that it solely works with RCS chats. It now appears like Google has flipped the swap for traditional SMS/texts, too.
As a Reddit consumer factors out, Google Messages seems to have quietly enabled chat themes for non-RCS chats. A fast look on my Pixel 6a confirms this, with a purple dot prompting customers to attempt it for the primary time.
It’s unclear how lengthy this function has been lively, and we will’t discover any official help web page doc that mentions this enlargement to incorporate non-RCS chats.
Whereas RCS messaging is changing into the norm, it hasn’t absolutely changed standard textual content messages but. With this in thoughts, it is smart for Google to deliver this function to all Messages customers.
Along with discovering chat themes by way of the three-dot menu on the high proper of the dialog, customers may entry this function on the contact data web page by tapping the consumer’s identify.
The brand new chat theme function limits the wallpaper to the one that units it. Against this, the earlier “Change colours” possibility, which was additionally restricted to RCS chats, modified the colours for everybody within the chat.
Eradicating this limitation implies that each Google Messages dialog, whether or not RCS or SMS, could be adorned with preset or customized wallpapers and the consumer’s most popular colours. Since adjustments are solely mirrored regionally in your telephone, there was nothing holding Google Messages again from implementing this customization function for traditional texts as nicely.
So, when you have somebody in your contacts who nonetheless makes use of the old school SMS, there’s lastly a option to give the chat a visible improve.
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