Summary
- Google Messages beta could soon offer remote message deletion like rival top chat apps through an upcoming, long-awaited update.
- RCS chat deletion will have an accompanying 15-minute time limit, so you can delete the text for yourself and the recipient.
- The remote deletion UI will resemble rival apps and be compatible with newer versions of Messages since it uses recent additions to the RCS protocol.
Communication tech has advanced and most of the best chat apps on Android now allow you to take back words by unsending or deleting messages. Meanwhile, SMS is still stuck in a time when your messages have the finality of a handwritten letter sent by post. The RCS protocol has so far done the impossible for SMS, allowing interoperability between iPhone and Android, and now it could enable message deletion too.
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Google’s Messages app is the company’s sole platform with RCS support. Offering this new communications standard to users has brought several conveniences to the boring world of SMS, including read receipts, typing indicators, and better media sharing support. Now, popular Google app researcher and tipster @AssembleDebug on X tells Android Authority that version 20250317_01_RC00 in beta could allow remotely deleting texts.
Until now, deleting something you sent or received in Messages only deletes the content for you. The original sender of the former and recipients of what you sent will still retain a copy of what you’re deleting. Remote deletion works like Delete for everyone in instant chat apps like WhatsApp, where you can erase messages for the recipient as well, if you are the sender. The latest beta includes the UI elements for the upcoming feature.
Remote deletion may be incompatible with older app versions
There’s a window of time too
The user-facing elements of this upcoming remote deletion feature in Messages resemble other chat apps, and that’s great for familiarity since everyone uses multiple chat apps now. When you choose to delete a text, you’ll see options to Delete for me or Delete for everyone. The second option uses new additions to the RCS Universal Profile, so if you’re using an older version of Messages with RCS, message deletion may not work.
Another element borrowed from other chat apps is the time limit before the remote deletion option goes away for good. You’ll have 15 minutes to change your mind after you shoot that text. We are glad to see Google devs keeping up with recent updates to the RCS specifications and working to bring some of those features to Messages soon. When this might roll out is anyone’s best guess, but we don’t think the wait will be long.
