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How does RCS with fallback to SMS work?

RCS Business Messaging (RBM) allows you ...

RCS Business Messaging (RBM) allows you to send advanced messages with images, videos, buttons and interactive elements. However, RCS business messaging requires the receiver to have an RCS-compatible device, where RCS is activated, as well as an active internet connection via mobile network or WiFi.

What happens if the recipient cannot receive RCS?

If a recipient does not have an RCS-capa...

If a recipient does not have an RCS-capable device or has not enabled RCS, the message can automatically fall back to a regular SMS. This ensures that the recipient still gets the message even if they can’t receive the full RCS experience.

The following are the most prevalent scenarios when fallback to SMS is enabled:

  • If the recipient’s device supports RCS and has an internet connection, the message is delivered in RCS format.
  • If the recipient’s device supports RCS but does not have an internet connection, there will often be a number of retries within a given timeframe. For use cases with time-critical messages, instant fallback to SMS is also an option. All these variables depend on the use case and the features the message service provides though.
  • If the recipient’s device doesn’t support RCS, the message is sent as a plain text SMS.
  • If the recipient’s network operator does not support RCS, the message is sent as a regular SMS in many cases.

Text limitations and encoding for fallback SMS messages

One of the benefits of RCS is that a mes...

One of the benefits of RCS is that a message can contain more characters than a normal SMS. When an RCS message falls back to SMS, it can affect the price and format of the message, as SMS has technical limitations:

  • A regular SMS has a limit of 160 characters when using standard GSM-7 encoding.
  • If the message contains special characters, emojis or non-Latin characters, the encoding is switched to UCS-2, where the limit drops to 70 characters per SMS.
  • If a message exceeds these limits, it is split into several parts. The recipient’s phone usually merges them automatically, but this can increase costs for the sender.

Fallback to SMS ensures that messages always arrive, but it’s important to be aware of text limitations and encoding, as long messages can be split into multiple SMS segments, increasing sending costs.

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