Summary
- Some Android users are experiencing distorted GIFs from iPhones in Google Messages.
- Turning off “Send photos faster” in Google Messages may resolve the GIF glitch for some.
- The issue doesn’t affect all iPhone-to-Android chats, possibly pointing to an iOS-related bug.
Even with plenty of modern options, SMS messaging apps remain a go-to solution for many people. So, it’s easy to see why it’s annoying when a messaging app doesn’t work right, like when GIFs sent from Google Messages on iPhones to Android phones get messed up. Over the past few weeks, some Android users have noticed that GIFs from iPhones are arriving distorted in Google Messages.
Several Android users have reported this problem on a number of Reddit posts, affecting devices from different manufacturers like Google and Samsung. As per 9to5Google, the issue seems to occur with GIFs sent via SMS/MMS from iPhones. This makes sense because iOS doesn’t support the Rich Communication Services (RCS) platform just yet.
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Google hasn’t officially acknowledged this issue yet, but some users might have found a workaround. One Pixel 7 Pro owner fixed the problem by turning off the “Send photos faster” setting in Google Messages. This seems to work for most people dealing with the GIF glitch. However, another Android user reported that this fix didn’t work for them, as GIFs from an iPhone still appeared distorted even after disabling that option.
The issue doesn’t seem to affect every iPhone-to-Android chat
While users of various Android devices have noticed the issue, it doesn’t affect all iPhone-to-Android conversations, according to 9to5. It seems the problem isn’t with the Android OS but likely with the Messages app itself. Since this distortion doesn’t happen in Android-to-Android chats, some think iOS might be the culprit. A bug in iOS’s compression or rendering process could be causing these messed-up GIFs.
Reports of this issue have been on the rise since the middle of this month, with some Android users saying it’s been happening for weeks prior to that. This comes as Apple gets ready to introduce RCS on iPhones, with the first beta of iOS 18 expected to roll out next month at WWDC 2024. The feature, launching through a software update, is set to bring iMessage-style features to messaging between iPhone and Android users.