Apple unveiled iOS 26 on Monday, and the upcoming software update brings several significant new features for the Messages app.
The new features in Messages on iOS 26 include:
- “Add Contact” button in group chats: A new “Add Contact” button in group chats makes it easier to add people to the Contacts app.
- Apple Cash in group chats: You can now send and receive Apple Cash in group chats.
- Backgrounds: Backgrounds can now be added to any conversation, and all of the chat’s participants will see it. You can choose from a pre-set selection of backgrounds, or you can select any of your own photos to use as a background. Conversation backgrounds can also be disabled in the Settings app.
- End-to-end encryption for RCS: Apple is planning to add support for end-to-end encrypted RCS messages to the Messages app in a future iOS update, which is likely to be iOS 26, or a later version. This will prevent Apple, your cellular provider, or any other third party from being able to read RCS messages and attachments being sent between devices. This feature was previously limited to iMessage blue bubble conversations between Apple device users.
- Live Translation: This is integrated into Messages to help users communicate across languages, translating text on the fly.
- Natural language search: Photos within a conversation cannow be searched for by describing what you are looking for. Examples: “Georgie riding her bike in a Buccee’s shirt,” or “Kenzie with glasses on her face.”
- Photo previews: Enabling the new “Send Photo Previews” setting tells the Messages app to only send a lower-quality preview of a photo when an iPhone is in Low Data Mode. A full-quality version of the photo will be sent later.
- Polls: Users can now create polls in group chats, enabling the other people in the group chat to vote on topics or questions. This can help when a group is deciding on what to do on a day or evening out, such as which restaurant to go to. Apple Intelligence can even detect when a poll might come in handy and suggest one.
- “Select” option: When you tap and hold on a message bubble, a new “Select” option appears. Tapping on it allows you to select a portion of text in a message, whereas you could previously only copy an entire message.
- Typing indicators in group chats: You can now see who is typing a reply in group chats.
- Unknown sender screening: This new feature automatically moves messages from unknown senders to the “Unknown Senders” folder (makes sense), and hides any notifications for their messages until you accept them. Spam is also automatically detected and moveed to a new Spam folder, notifications for these messages are also hidden.
iOS 26 is available for testing by developers through the Apple Developer Program, and a public beta will be available through the Apple Beta Software Program next month. The new software will be available this fall as a free software update for iPhone 11 and later.
