Android messaging apps in 2026: what 4 listings say about your messages

Updated September 2026 · Verified against the Play Store listings on 3 September 2026 · full breakdown below. Every Data safety page re-read in full, the decision table rebuilt around what each app does with message content and with metadata, and each project's own release record read

Four Android messaging apps, each read at its own Google Play listing on 21 August 2026. This page reports what the four listings and the four developers publish: the encryption claim and its scope, the Data safety declaration, the price and the release record. It does not treat any of those declarations as proof, because a declaration is not an audit. For the wider field rather than this year's records, see our free messaging apps roundup.

The monthly umbrella for this series is best new apps for Android, where every entry is dated by its own Play release field.

The default on most phones, and the only one of the four that can carry your text messages at all

Rating 4.3 from 46,012,047 reviews · Installs 10,000,000,000+ · Free to install, no in-app purchases · Developer Google LLC · Listing updated 20 August 2026 · Contains ads: No · checked 2 September 2026

Google Play listing · 4.3 (46,012,047) · read 2 September 2026

The blunt part first: this is the only one of the four whose Data safety page declares that the app may collect your messages. Under Data collected it lists a Messages category covering SMS or MMS and Other in-app messages, both optional, for App functionality and for Fraud prevention, security, and compliance, read 2 September 2026. It is also the only one declaring third-party sharing. Free to install, no in-app purchases, no Contains ads label.

End-to-end encryption, scoped. Inside RCS, and there by default. Google's own help page, read 21 August 2026, says Google Messages supports end-to-end encryption when messaging other users using Google Messages over Rich Communication Services (RCS) and, on the same page, End-to-end encryption isn't available for SMS/MMS messages. Those are two claims, not one: the protection is on by default inside that lane and absent outside it. Who may be at the other end is where Google's own pages disagree, and this page prints both rather than picking the tidier one. The help page, read 21 August 2026, still says Currently only Google Messages supports end-to-end encrypted RCS. Google's own Android blog, dated 11 May 2026 and read 21 August 2026, says end-to-end encrypted RCS messaging begins rolling out in beta for iPhone users running iOS 26.5 with supported carriers and Android users on the latest version of Google Messages. Our RCS and SMS explainer carries the same announcement from Apple's side. Neither Google page carries a note reconciling it with the other, so this page does not reconcile them either.

• Good: Its Data safety page, read in full on 21 August 2026, is the only one of the four carrying an Independent security review line, which states This app has been independently validated against a global security standard.
• Good: Google's own help page, read 2 September 2026, states that RCS conversations between Google Messages users default to end-to-end encryption, so inside that lane the protection is not something a reader has to find and switch on
• Good: The record behind it is the biggest here: 4.3 from 46,012,047 reviews against an install band of 10,000,000,000+, which is the store's own count of installs and not a count of people (read 2 September 2026)
• Con: Its Data safety page is the only one of the four declaring data shared with third parties, and it names Personal info covering name, email address, user IDs and phone number, Location as Precise location, and Device or other IDs, all for App functionality (read 2 September 2026)
• Con: The same page's Data collected list is the longest of the four: Audio, Personal info, App activity, Files and docs, Messages, Location, App info and performance, Device or other IDs, Photos and videos and Contacts, ten categories where Signal declares one (read 21 August 2026)
• Con: The encrypted lane has three conditions on Google's own help page, read 21 August 2026: the Google Messages app, RCS chats turned on, and the message going over data or Wi-Fi. Missing one does not always look the same, and the same page is specific about which is which. Lose the connection and the conversation will downgrade to SMS; a chat reverts to SMS only if you or your contact lose or disable RCS, or switch to a new phone or operating system; but a recipient whose app does not support it leaves the chat on RCS with no encryption at all, since the page also says nor is RCS if the Messaging app does not support it. The check Google publishes is the lock on the send button and beside the timestamp, not the fact that the message went

Skip it if. Skip this if a listing that declares no third-party sharing matters more to you than the size of the record behind it.

Against its neighbour. Take Google Messages over Signal if RCS to other Google Messages users is most of your messaging and you want the app your phone already treats as the default. Take Signal over it if the sharing line is the part you cannot accept.

Back to the comparison table

The narrowest declared collection on this page, with a large rating sample behind it

Rating 4.5 from 2,904,497 reviews · Installs 100,000,000+ · Free to install, in-app purchases $1.99 an item · Developer Signal Foundation · Version 8.23.3, updated 17 August 2026 · Contains ads: No · checked 21 August 2026

Google Play listing · 4.5 (2,904,497) · read 21 August 2026

The blunt part is not the price but the phone number: an account needs one, its Data safety page declares that single type under Data collected, and the same policy says separate technical information sits on Signal's own servers, read 21 August 2026. Against that, its own documentation makes the narrowest claim of the four and the flattest one. Free to install, no Contains ads label, in-app purchases at $1.99 an item.

End-to-end encryption, scoped. All messages and calls, by default. Its own privacy policy, read 21 August 2026, states Signal cannot decrypt or otherwise access the content of your messages or calls. That is a claim about content, made by the operator about itself. The same policy is separate about metadata, and that sentence is quoted below, because the two are not the same claim.

• Good: The same privacy policy, read 21 August 2026, extends that past the operator: Signal messages and calls cannot be accessed by us or other third parties because they are always end-to-end encrypted, private, and secure. One document, covering both halves of who can read what
• Good: Its Data safety page, read in full on 21 August 2026, declares no data shared with third parties and exactly one collected type, a phone number, for App functionality and Account management
• Good: Store and project agree on what is shipping: the project's own releases page, read 21 August 2026, dates 8.23.3 to 17 August 2026, and the listing offers that version carrying the same two release notes the project published beside it
• Con: An account needs a phone number, which the policy states plainly and which its Data safety page declares under Data collected, so the narrowest declaration on this page is still bought with an identifier tied to a phone line (read 21 August 2026)
• Con: The same policy is explicit that content is not the whole story: Additional technical information is stored on our servers, including randomly generated authentication tokens, keys, push tokens, and other material that is necessary to establish calls and transmit messages. Message content and message metadata are different claims and this page keeps them apart
• Con: Its Data safety page carries no Independent security review line, and one page on this list does (read 21 August 2026). A Data safety section is a developer declaration either way, and none of the four is an audit

Skip it if. Skip this if you need to reach people over plain text messages: its own listing, read 21 August 2026, says Signal uses your phone's data connection, so you avoid SMS and MMS fees.

Against its neighbour. Take Signal over SimpleX Chat if you want the operator itself to state that it cannot read message content, and a score with millions of reviews behind it. Take SimpleX Chat over Signal if not handing over a phone number is the point.

Back to the comparison table

The only Data safety page here declaring nothing collected and nothing shared

Rating 4.0 from 2,669 reviews · Installs 1,000,000+ · Free to install, in-app purchases $6.99 to $420.00 an item · Developer SimpleX Chat · Version 7.0, updated 18 August 2026 · Contains ads: No · checked 2 September 2026

Google Play listing · 4.0 (2,669) · read 2 September 2026

The blunt part is the sample: 2,669 reviews is a very small base for a score, and the same page declares no security practices where the other three declare two each, read 2 September 2026. Free to install, no Contains ads label, in-app purchases running $6.99 to $420.00 an item, the widest range here. Against that, it declares the least of the four: no data shared with third parties, and no data collected.

End-to-end encryption, scoped. Message content, by the project's own description of its layers: its own glossary, read 21 August 2026, describes a double ratchet algorithm for end-to-end encryption with perfect forward secrecy and post-compromise security, plus a further layer for each messaging queue and another between server and recipient inside TLS. That is a claim about the protocol rather than a statement by an operator about what it can read, and the two are not interchangeable.

• Good: Its Data safety page, read 21 August 2026, carries two lines under the headings and nothing else: no data shared with third parties, and no data collected
• Good: The project publishes its own release record, and its releases page, read 21 August 2026, dates 7.0.1 to 18 August 2026, the same day its Play listing was updated
• Good: A third party has reviewed part of it, and the scope is old. Its Play listing, read 21 August 2026, carries the link inside the developer's own description text, and it points at a post on the developer's own site, read 21 August 2026, published 8 November 2022, which says Trail of Bits had 2 engineers reviewing SimpleX Chat for one calendar week, specifically simplexmq library. That is version 4.2, against the 7.0 the listing offers today, so it is a real independent review of an older build and not a check on what ships now
• Con: Its listing publishes in-app purchases running $6.99 to $420.00 an item, the widest range of the four, so free to install is a long way from the whole price (read 21 August 2026)
• Con: 4.0 rests on 2,669 reviews. A score on a few thousand reviews and a score on millions are not the same measurement, and this page does not rank them as though they were
• Con: Its Data safety page is also the only one of the four that lists no Security practices section at all: the other three each declare that data is encrypted in transit and that deletion can be requested, and this one declares neither (read 21 August 2026). Declaring nothing collected and declaring no security practices are different statements, and this listing makes both

Skip it if. Skip this if you want a published rating with a large sample behind it before you install anything.

Against its neighbour. Take SimpleX Chat over Google Messages if the declared collection is what you are choosing on. Take Google Messages over it if you need to reach people over plain text messages, because nothing in SimpleX Chat's own listing, read 21 August 2026, mentions SMS at all.

Back to the comparison table

Voice-first, and the only entry here with no end-to-end encryption claim in any document read for this page

No rating and no review count are published on its listing · Installs 1,000+ · Free to install, no in-app purchases · Developer field Haiket · Version 1.52 from the listing's own What's new section · Listing updated 4 August 2026 · Contains ads: No · checked 21 August 2026

Google Play listing · read 21 August 2026

The blunt part sits in its own privacy policy, read 21 August 2026: the audio it collects for voice messages may be uploaded to the Company's servers and/or a Service Provider's server or it may be stored on Your device, and no document read here claims end-to-end encryption. Free to install, no in-app purchases, no Contains ads label. Google Play publishes no star rating and no review count for it either, which is an absence at the store rather than a low score. The listing names the developer as Haiket and, under About the developer, AN Software GmbH in Zug, Switzerland.

End-to-end encryption, scoped. No end-to-end claim appears in any document read for this entry. Its own privacy policy, last updated 26 April 2026 and read 21 August 2026, does not contain the word encryption once, and its own site carries one line, Voice-first messaging. Perfected. The only encryption statement on any source read for this entry is the security practice on its Data safety page, Data is encrypted in transit, which describes the connection and says nothing about whether the operator can read what travels over it. No source we read publishes an end-to-end encryption claim for Haiket; that is the state of the documentation this page found, not a finding about the app.

• Good: Its Data safety page, read 21 August 2026, declares no data shared with third parties, that data is encrypted in transit, and that deletion can be requested
• Good: Its listing publishes a release record: a What's new section headed What's new in 1.52, naming a fix for photos, videos and files sent together and a fix for media summary notifications, read 21 August 2026
• Good: Its listing was updated 4 August 2026, so the store record behind it is weeks rather than years old
• Con: Google Play publishes no rating and no review count for it, checked 21 August 2026, so there is no published measure of what anyone makes of it
• Con: Its listing opens with a superlative in the developer's own wording, Fastest messenger in the world., and the same listing publishes no rating and no review count to weigh that against (read 21 August 2026)
• Con: That policy states that the app may collect, with permission, Audio recordings (microphone) for voice messages and calls, the device phone book and a phone number, and that the information may go to company or service provider servers. For a voice-first messenger with no end-to-end claim anywhere, that is the whole of the question

Skip it if. Skip this if you want any documented statement about who can read what you send, because no source read for this page carries one.

Against its neighbour. Take Haiket over SimpleX Chat only if voice-first messaging is the whole point for you. Take SimpleX Chat over it on documentation alone, since one of the two publishes an encryption claim and the other does not.

Back to the comparison table

The four are documented to very different depths, and most of that difference belongs to the store and to the developers rather than to the apps.

What Android itself decides. Three of these four are internet messengers and one is the phone's text messaging app, and that split is set by the platform rather than by the developers. Google's own documentation for Android, read 21 August 2026, says Your app must ask to become a default handler before it requests the permissions associated with being that handler, and gives the default SMS handler and the read SMS permission as its worked example. Google Play's own policy on the SMS and Call Log permission groups, read the same day, says apps must be actively registered as the default SMS, Phone, or Assistant handler before prompting users to accept any of SMS or Call Log permissions and must immediately stop using the permission when they're no longer the default handler. So a new messaging app on Android cannot quietly take over your texts. It either becomes the one default text messaging app you pick, which is what Google Messages is on most phones, or it carries its own traffic instead. The other three listings, read 21 August 2026, describe the second: Signal's says Signal uses your phone's data connection, so you avoid SMS and MMS fees, and neither SimpleX Chat's nor Haiket's mentions SMS at all.

What each says about message content. Signal's policy makes the flattest claim, that the operator cannot access it. SimpleX Chat's glossary describes end-to-end encryption with forward secrecy, which is a claim about the protocol rather than about an operator. Google's documentation makes the most tightly scoped claim of the three, end-to-end encryption inside RCS and explicitly not for SMS or MMS, and its two pages do not agree on who may be at the other end. Its help page, read 21 August 2026, still says Currently only Google Messages supports end-to-end encrypted RCS, while Google's own Android blog of 11 May 2026, read the same day, announced encrypted RCS rolling out in beta for iPhone users running iOS 26.5 with supported carriers and Android users on the latest version of Google Messages. Our RCS and SMS explainer sources the same announcement to Apple as well. For Haiket, no source we read publishes an end-to-end claim at all; the one encryption statement its record carries is the store's Data is encrypted in transit, which is about the connection.

What each declares about metadata. This is the separate question, and it does not follow from the first. Signal's policy states that additional technical information sits on its servers, and an account needs a phone number. SimpleX Chat's own site, read 21 August 2026, claims The first network without user IDs. Google Messages declares the broadest collection here and the only third-party sharing. Haiket declares a phone number, contacts as optional, and crash, diagnostic and other app performance data.

What each declares about security practices. Three of the four Data safety pages carry a Security practices section stating that data is encrypted in transit and that deletion can be requested. SimpleX Chat's carries none at all, read 21 August 2026. Google Messages' is the only one of the four with an Independent security review line. SimpleX Chat's Play listing, read 21 August 2026, carries a link inside the developer's own description to a post on the developer's own site, read 2 September 2026 and published 8 November 2022, describing a Trail of Bits review of the simplexmq library at version 4.2, against the 7.0 the listing offers today. None of that is an audit this page performed, and a Data safety page is a declaration made to Google Play.

Ratings, install bands and price. Google Messages shows 4.3 from 46,012,047 reviews against 10,000,000,000+ installs, Signal 4.5 from 2,904,497 against 100,000,000+, SimpleX Chat 4.0 from 2,636 against 1,000,000+, and Haiket's listing publishes no rating and no review count at all. A score on a few thousand reviews and a score on millions are not the same measurement, so the Rating column is not a ranking and the fourth entry is not last: it has no score to be last with. The install bands are the store's own counts of installs, rounded down, and none is a count of people. All four install free and none carries a Contains ads label; two publish purchase ranges, Signal at $1.99 an item and SimpleX Chat from $6.99 to $420.00 an item. Read on 21 August 2026.

It comes down to which claim you need to hold, and who is making it. If you want one answer it is Signal, for the reason the capsule gives: its own policy is the only unscoped operator statement of the four. SimpleX Chat's is a claim about the protocol, Google's is scoped to encrypted RCS, and no source read for this page makes one for Haiket.

Take Signal if you want the operator itself to state that it cannot read message content. Accept in exchange that an account is tied to a phone number, that its own policy names separate technical information kept on its servers, and that its listing publishes purchases at $1.99 an item.

Take SimpleX Chat if the metadata question is the one you care about, and its declaration of nothing collected and nothing shared is what you are choosing on. Accept in exchange that its score rests on the smallest published sample here, that its purchase range runs to $420.00 an item, and that the same page declares no security practices where the other three declare two each.

Take Google Messages if it is already the default on your phone and RCS is most of what you send. Go in knowing the scope: SMS and MMS fall outside the encryption whatever else is true, Google's own two pages disagree on whether an iPhone can sit at the other end of an encrypted RCS chat, and its Data safety page is the only one of the four declaring third-party sharing and the only one declaring it may collect messages.

Take Haiket only if voice-first messaging is the whole point. Go in knowing that no document read for this page claims end-to-end encryption for it, that its own policy says voice audio may be uploaded to company or service provider servers, and that Google Play publishes no rating for it to check anything against.

None of that is a statement about how any of these apps behaves once it is installed, and this page does not make one.

This page's premise is the year, so the question is not only whether each of the four is listed but whether anyone is still shipping it, and from what record that can be told. Two of the four publish a release record outside the store and two do not.

Signal. The project's own releases page, read 21 August 2026, carries four entries not marked as pre-releases inside the last month: 8.20.5 on 30 July 2026, 8.22.2 on 10 August 2026, 8.21.6 on 13 August 2026 and 8.23.3 on 17 August 2026. Two things follow. Store and project agree on the newest of them: the Play listing offers 8.23.3 and its What's new carries the same two release notes the project published beside that release, without the project's own line recommending an update tool. And the version numbers on that page do not run in date order, because 8.21.6 carries a lower number and a later date than 8.22.2, with the same release notes. The releases page publishes no note explaining that, so this page reports it and does not explain it either.

SimpleX Chat. Its own releases page, read 21 August 2026, carries two entries not marked as pre-releases, 7.0.1 on 18 August 2026 and 7.0.0 on 28 July 2026, twenty one days apart. Its newest entry of any kind is a 7.1.0 pre-release dated 20 August 2026, which this page does not count as a release for either project. Its Play listing was updated on the same day as the newer of the two, and the listing's What's new is headed for version 7.0 while the project's entry for that day is 7.0.1. The two strings are not the same, and no source read for this page reconciles them.

Google Messages. No source read for this page publishes release notes for it. The listing's own What's new line, read 21 August 2026, says only that the update brings bug fixes and stability improvements, so the update date of 20 August 2026 says when the store record changed and not what changed. That silence is what the record contains; it is not evidence that little changed.

Haiket. Its own site publishes one line and no release information we could find, but its listing does publish a release record: a What's new section headed for version 1.52, naming a fix for photos, videos and files sent together and a fix for media summary notifications, read 21 August 2026. With the listing date of 4 August 2026 beside it, that is the whole of the maintenance signal any source read for this entry publishes.

All four were listed, answered normally and had been updated within the last three weeks when they were re-read on 21 August 2026. That is what these records support, and it is less than the word new in this page's address promises. The address is frozen and the headline above makes no novelty claim, which is why the entries are described by what their sources publish rather than by how new they are.

Checked 21 August 2026: every figure on this page was re-read from source today. Google Messages now reads 4.3 from 46,012,047 reviews against 10,000,000,000+ installs, listing updated 20 August 2026; Signal 4.5 from 2,904,497 against 100,000,000+, version 8.23.3 updated 17 August 2026; SimpleX Chat 4.0 from 2,636 against 1,000,000+, updated 18 August 2026. Corrected, and the largest single error the previous version carried: it printed SimpleX Chat as free with no in-app purchases, and its listing today publishes a range of $6.99 to $420.00 an item. Corrected as well: the previous version described Google Messages' declared collection as reading Location, Personal info and 8 others, and said eight of the declared types were not named on the store page, which is what the summary strip shows. Its full Data safety page, read today, declares ten categories under Data collected, among them a Messages category covering SMS or MMS and other in-app messages, and that is now stated where a reader will meet it. New here and found only by reading the same pages in full: SimpleX Chat's Data safety page lists no Security practices section at all, where the other three each declare data encrypted in transit and deletion on request, and Google Messages is the only one of the four carrying an Independent security review line. The decision table has been rebuilt. Its Ads column is withdrawn as a column, because all four listings carry no Contains ads label and the previous version's own prose conceded, in the words now withdrawn with it, that column separates nothing here; in its place the table carries what each developer documents about end-to-end encryption of message content and, separately, what each Data safety page declares. The advertising reality is unchanged and still printed in every entry and in the price cell. The verdict capsule is rebuilt to the owner ruling of 2026-08-18: it was labelled Verdict and made of fragments, and it is now labelled Our answer, one self-contained sentence per pick, closing with the date it was checked. Release records for Signal and SimpleX Chat are read here for the first time from the projects' own releases pages, and Signal's entries are printed in full because their version numbers do not run in date order. Haiket's release record is stated here for the first time, and stated narrowly: its Play listing does publish a What's new section, with a version numeral and two named fixes, while its own site publishes none that we could find. Those are two different statements and only the narrower one is made. A new part of the comparison section, on what Android itself decides, is added, sourced to Google's own default handler documentation and to Google Play's own SMS and Call Log permission policy, because which of these apps can carry your text messages is settled by the platform and not by the developers. Re-derived rather than trusted, and named here only, since the changelog is the only zone allowed to carry them: the entries the previous pass withdrew were BirdyChat, bitchat, Messages by OzarksMade, Session and Molly, and that pass gave one reason for all five, that this page carried no store listing for any of them. For Session that reason does not survive re-derivation. A Google Play listing for it was read on 21 August 2026 and answered normally, with a published rating, an install band and an update dated in July 2026, so its absence from this page is a scope decision for this pass and not a finding about the app. The other four were not re-derived, because this page links no store record for any of them and a guessed package identifier has produced a false dead app on this site before. Corrected on re-reading Google's own sources rather than one of them: the encryption scope for Google Messages. Google's help page, read 21 August 2026, still says only Google Messages supports end-to-end encrypted RCS, while Google's own Android blog of 11 May 2026, read the same day, announced encrypted RCS rolling out in beta to iPhone users on iOS 26.5 with supporting carriers. Both are now printed, in the table, in the section, in the comparison and in the FAQ, and neither is presented as settling the other, because neither Google page carries a note reconciling it with the other. Our own RCS and SMS explainer, which sources the same announcement to Apple as well, is linked from the comparison for the same reason. Corrected too: what happens when a condition for encrypted RCS is missing. That is not one behaviour but three on Google's own page, and only two of them end in SMS; a recipient whose app does not support encrypted RCS stays on RCS with no encryption, which looks the same to a reader who is watching for a fallback. The lock on the send button, which Google publishes, is now given as the check instead. The Trail of Bits assessment SimpleX Chat's listing points at was previously reported as a link this page had not opened. It has now been read: it is a post on the developer's own site, published 8 November 2022, covering version 4.2 of one library against the 7.0 the listing offers today, and it is described that way rather than as a current independent check. The release records now state the same filter for both projects, since only entries not marked as pre-releases are counted and SimpleX Chat's newest entry of any kind is a 7.1.0 pre-release dated 20 August 2026. Signal's store and project entries are now said to carry the same two release notes rather than the same text, because the project's entry ends with a line about an update tool that the listing does not carry. The table's data column has been rebuilt onto the same three axes on every row, sharing, collection and security practices, so it compares the four instead of restating the verdict printed under each heading. Haiket stays out of the generated table and keeps its hand written entry with one merged cell, because its listing publishes no rating and a generated row would leave a blank cell that reads like a bad score.