Starting with the Samsung Galaxy S22 series, Samsung ships its smartphones with the Google Messages app as the default messaging app. Before this, Samsung had its own stock messaging app that was compatible with RCS as the default app in the US. Meanwhile, the S21 series launched in Europe with Google Messages as the default messaging app. The change was noted during a segment of MKBHD’s Waveform podcast.
It’s not like anyone couldn’t just head into the Play Store and download Google’s Messages app, at least those who were aware of the difference. It is likely that the average user won’t even notice that the app looks slightly different on the Galaxy S22 since Samsung re-designed its stock messaging app to look more like Google Messages last year with the S21 series in the US.
9to5Google noticed that although the Google version of the RCS app is set as the default on the new Galaxy flagships, the Samsung stock app is still found on the device and a user can switch back to it if they really wanted to.
Google Messages has gradually become the default messaging app choice for most Android device OEMs and Samsung is among the last Android OEM to make the switch to the preferred messaging app on Android.
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