So if you fancy rebelling against Google's forced use of the Hangouts app and going your own way, here are five alternative SMS apps to install and bring texting back to basics on Android.

It updates the basic text messaging app that comes pre-installed on almost every Android smartphone, and is part of Google’s strategy to uncouple its apps from its Android operating system.

While iMessage for iPhones and Google Messages for Android phones each employ end-to-end encryption, which prevents would-be hackers from accessing the content of messages sent over these programs ...

Switch from RCS to SMS on your Android phone by adjusting settings in the Messages app. Disable RCS chats to send texts via SMS without internet dependency.

Android may never have a universal messaging app, and perhaps it shouldn’t. Instead, Google could build APIs or services that allow syncing across apps, better notifications, or aggregated inboxes.

Text messages sent between iPhones and Android devices will soon benefit from end-to-end encryption (E2EE).

How to encrypt text messages with WhatsApp To ensure that messages between Apple and Android users are encrypted, you can use the text messaging app WhatsApp.

Verizon isn't the only firm that's ditched its messaging app this year. In July, Samsung stopped adding its messaging app to new Android devices, swapping over to Google Messages instead for US ...

Google Messages and RCS are the future of messaging on Android Verizon shutting down its messaging app in favor of Google Messages will help improve everyone's texting experience.

Today, T-Mobile has finally announced that satellite messaging is nearly here. To start, the company is rolling out a beta program specifically for T-Mobile customers.