Samsung Messages is demise. Here is the app I am changing it with

Samsung Messages goes away — and this time for excellent, with the app formally set to be discontinued in July 2026. After I were given my Galaxy S26 final month, Samsung Messages wasn’t even pre-installed. So, like maximum customers, I depended on Samsung’s advice and began the usage of Google Messages. It felt like the most obvious subsequent step, however unfortunately, it didn’t final very lengthy.

The nice factor is, I discovered one thing higher: Fossify Messages. It’s a unfastened, open-source app that makes a speciality of simplicity with out feeling barebones. Having used it for roughly every week, it looks like the following very best factor to Samsung Messages.

I truly attempted to love Google Messages, and I actually gave it a good shot. However the extra I used Google’s texting app, the extra it felt love it wasn’t constructed for me. Positive, those that love the usage of Google apps and products and services might need it, however it didn’t click on for me.

Let’s get started with the design. Google Messages has a blank interface, however it’s additionally very … Google. And that immediately displays after I transfer to it after the usage of Samsung apps all day.

The larger factor is the customization, or moderately, the loss of it. The most efficient you’ll be able to do is trade the chat bubble colours for particular person conversations. You’ll’t trade the background or the font — simply the bubble. That’s it. The topics possibility means that you can transfer between mild and darkish modes, and whilst I in my opinion love the usage of a dismal theme all over, I don’t like Google’s implementation. It’s that blend of grey and black that by no means fairly feels proper. Worse, there’s no strategy to tweak it.

Gemini is some other section that doesn’t sit down proper with me. I am getting why it’s there, and I’m certain some folks adore it. However to me, it feels extra distracting than useful. I don’t want Gemini’s Magic Compose to best possible my messages. Messaging, in my view, must be easy and uncooked. After all, Gemini too can generate photographs, pull up data from different Google apps, and solution any questions. All of this is spectacular, however it’s no longer one thing I would like within my messaging app. If the rest, I’m satisfied Google offers customers the solution to flip off Gemini solely.

All of these items driven me to search for an alternate, even though that supposed giving up RCS. And in truth, I’m satisfied I did, as it led me to Fossify Messages.

Fossify Messages feels very other from each Google Messages and Samsung Messages. It doesn’t attempt to do the whole thing, and that’s precisely why it really works so smartly. It makes a speciality of doing the fundamentals truly smartly, which is what textual content messaging must be all about. You get the whole thing you if truth be told want — SMS, MMS, staff messaging, message scheduling, and a seek bar. However there are not any needless options or AI muddle that get to your means. This simplicity may be what makes the app so light-weight and speedy.

I additionally like the truth that Fossify Messages is totally unfastened. This won’t look like a lot, however in the event you’ve ever used fashionable SMS apps like Pulse SMS or Textra, you know the way uncommon this is. The ones apps are nice, certainly, however they do push you towards paying — both to take away advertisements or unencumber additional options. Fossify Messages is the complete opposite. You don’t come throughout any irritating banners or locked options whilst the usage of the app.

What truly makes it stand out, regardless that, is that it’s open-source. It approach any person can have a look at the code to know precisely what the app is doing at the back of the scenes. It additionally approach the app isn’t constructed round gathering your information. If truth be told, Fossify Messages doesn’t require an account and works totally offline.

It’s no longer simply the open-source nature or the clutter-free UI that offered me on Fossify Messages. The ones issues indisputably piqued my interest sufficient to check out it, however it’s the smaller main points that saved me sticking round.

Take textual content variety, for example. Fossify shall we me choose explicit portions of a message, which, unusually, you’ll be able to’t do in Google Messages. And it’s to hand as it shall we me take hold of a line, an deal with, or a host as an alternative of copying all the message. Every other small however helpful function is the facility to fasten the app with a PIN, development, or biometrics. This isn’t one thing that’s conceivable natively on my Galaxy telephone, so I in finding it helpful.

With regards to customization, Fossify Messages doesn’t prohibit me to the usual mild and darkish topics. It gives choices like Darkish Pink, White, Black & White, and an absolutely customizable mode. That customized possibility shall we me tweak the textual content, background, and number one colours, in addition to the app icon colour. There’s even an solution to trade the font taste, giving me entire regulate over how the app seems to be and feels. Unfortunately, there’s no solution to trade chat backgrounds like you’ll be able to in Samsung Messages, which is just a little of a omit, however total, it doesn’t provide you with a lot to whinge about.

In any case, whilst Fossify Messages doesn’t be offering cloud sync, it does give me native backups. That implies if I ever transfer telephones, I will merely take my messages with me through making a backup document. After all, none of that is groundbreaking, however those are issues that I discovered lacking in Google Messages.

As excellent as Fossify Messages is, Samsung Messages stays extremely laborious to overcome. I nonetheless omit the facility to prepare chats into classes and customise them with photographs from my telephone’s gallery. Additionally, being a Samsung app, it paired completely with my Galaxy telephone.

As for Google Messages, I will’t deny that RCS is a large explanation why to stay with it. Somebody who is determined by RCS doesn’t truly have a lot of a decision at this time however to make use of Google Messages. For me, regardless that, that trade-off isn’t a dealbreaker. And that’s precisely why Fossify Messages works so smartly for me.