RCS vs SMS Marketing: The Numbers and Why It Matters

SMS Has Been King for 30 Years. Here Is What Is Replacing It.

SMS is one of the most successful communication technologies ever built. Since the early 2000s, it has been the backbone of business-to-customer messaging, and for good reason: near-universal reach, near-instant delivery, and open rates around 98% (Gartner, 2024). Every phone on the planet can receive a text.

But SMS has not evolved in decades. It is still limited to 160 characters of plain text (or concatenated multi-part messages), links that look suspicious, and zero visual content. In a world where your customers scroll through Instagram stories, swipe through TikTok feeds, and tap through beautifully designed apps all day, a plain text message feels like a fax machine.

RCS (Rich Communication Services) is what SMS would look like if it were invented today. It delivers high-resolution images, tappable action buttons, swipeable carousels, and verified business branding through the default messaging app on the customer's phone. No app download. No account creation. Same inbox, vastly better experience.

And with Apple adding RCS support to iOS 18 in September 2024, over 90% of US smartphones can now receive RCS messages (Sinch, 2025). The "Android-only" objection is gone. Globally, RCS has surpassed 2.1 billion monthly active users (Sinch, 2025), and Google reported more than 1 billion RCS messages sent per day in the US alone as of May 2025.

So how do these two channels actually stack up? Here are the numbers.

Head-to-Head: RCS vs SMS by the Numbers

The numbers tell a clear story. Open rates are comparable because both channels land in the same messaging app. The divergence happens after the open. RCS gives customers something to interact with (buttons, images, carousels), and that interactivity drives dramatically higher engagement.

A 5% CTR versus a 20% CTR is not incremental. It is 4x the number of customers taking action from your message. For a local business sending a weekly promotion to a list of 2,000 customers, that is the difference between 100 clicks and 400 clicks per campaign. Conversion rates widen the gap further: RCS campaigns achieve 20-40% conversion among engaged users versus 3-5% for SMS (Infobip, 2025), thanks to one-tap booking buttons that eliminate multi-step website navigation.

What the Same Message Looks Like: SMS vs RCS

Numbers are convincing. Visuals are more convincing. Here is the exact same promotion sent through both channels.

SMS Version

Spring Special! 20% off all facials
this week. Book at
medspa.com/book?utm_source=sms
Reply STOP to unsubscribe.

Plain text. A URL that looks like it could be spam. No image. No button. The customer has to read the text, decide they are interested, manually tap the URL, wait for the page to load, and then navigate the booking form. Every step is friction. Every step loses people.

RCS Version

Same promotion. Completely different experience. The customer sees a professional photo, reads the offer in a clean layout, and taps "Book Now" to go directly to the booking page. One tap from message to action.

Appointment Reminder Comparison

SMS: ``` Reminder: You have an appointment with Dr. Lee on Thurs 3/27 at 2pm. Reply C to confirm or call 555-0123 to reschedule. ```

RCS: ``` Your appointment with Dr. Lee

Thursday, March 27 at 2:00 PM Downtown Office -- Suite 200

[ Confirm ] [ Reschedule ] [ Get Directions ] ```

The RCS version eliminates the need to type a reply code or make a phone call. One tap confirms. One tap opens the rescheduling page. One tap pulls up directions. Fewer no-shows. Less phone tag for your front desk.

Real Brand Results

This is not theoretical. Established brands running controlled tests have published their RCS vs SMS results.

Clarins: 2x Click-Through Rate

French luxury skincare brand Clarins tested RCS against SMS for promotional campaigns. RCS messages delivered double the click-through rate of equivalent SMS messages. The rich media format (product images with direct "Shop Now" buttons) drove significantly more traffic to their e-commerce pages (Sinch case study, 2024).

Casas Bahia: 6.2x ROI

Brazilian retailer Casas Bahia used RCS carousels to showcase product deals during a promotional period. Their RCS campaigns generated 6.2x return on investment compared to standard SMS campaigns. The visual carousel format, where customers swiped through deals and tapped to purchase, transformed passive recipients into active shoppers (Google RCS case study, 2024).

BankBazaar: 130% CTR Lift

Indian financial marketplace BankBazaar A/B tested RCS against SMS for customer acquisition. RCS delivered a 130% lift in click-through rate. The verified sender branding and interactive format built more trust and drove more engagement than plain text (Infobip case study, 2024).

Subway: 140% Higher Engagement

Subway tested RCS for promotional offers and measured 140% higher engagement rates compared to SMS. Rich card messages with sandwich photos and "Order Now" buttons significantly outperformed text-only promotions (Sinch case study, 2025).

These are not cherry-picked startups. These are established brands running large-sample tests. The pattern is consistent across industries and geographies: RCS outperforms SMS by 2-6x on engagement metrics.

What the Results Have in Common

Across every published case study, three factors drive the engagement gap:

1. Visual content captures attention. A product photo or treatment image stops the scroll in a way that plain text cannot. The human brain processes images 60,000 times faster than text (MIT, 2014), and RCS puts that advantage directly into the messaging channel.
2. Buttons reduce friction to zero. When the call-to-action is a tappable button rather than a URL to copy-paste, the number of customers who follow through increases dramatically. Every additional step in a conversion path loses 20-40% of potential customers (Baymard Institute, 2024).
3. Verified branding builds trust. Customers are more likely to engage with a message that displays a business name, logo, and verification badge than one from an unidentified phone number. In an era where SMS phishing ("smishing") attacks have increased by over 300% since 2021 (Proofpoint, 2024), verified identity is a significant competitive advantage.

The Cost Math: More Per Message, Cheaper Per Conversion

The most common objection to RCS is cost. And it is true: RCS costs slightly more per send. But evaluating messaging channels on per-message cost alone is like comparing a billboard to a Google ad without looking at conversion rates.

Campaign Comparison: 5,000-Customer Send

SMS Campaign:

• Messages sent: 5,000
• Cost per message: $0.015
• Total cost: $75
• CTR: 5% = 250 clicks
• Conversion: 4% of clicks = 10 bookings
• Revenue at $75/booking: $750
• Cost per conversion: $7.50
• ROI: 10x

RCS Campaign:

• Messages sent: 5,000
• Cost per message: $0.02
• Total cost: $100
• CTR: 20% = 1,000 clicks
• Conversion: 30% of clicks = 300 bookings
• Revenue at $75/booking: $22,500
• Cost per conversion: $0.33
• ROI: 225x

You spent $25 more on the RCS campaign. You generated 290 more bookings. The cost per conversion dropped from $7.50 to $0.33.

Even at conservative RCS estimates (12% CTR, 15% conversion), you still get 90 bookings at $1.11 each versus 10 bookings at $7.50 each for SMS. The math works at every reasonable assumption because the engagement multiplier far exceeds the cost multiplier.

Volume Pricing Closes the Gap

Most RCS providers offer tiered pricing. At volumes above 10,000 messages per month, per-message costs for RCS drop to $0.01-0.015, essentially matching standard SMS rates. For high-volume local businesses (multi-location restaurants, franchise med spas), the per-send cost difference becomes negligible while the performance advantage remains massive.

The Fallback Safety Net

What about customers whose phones do not support RCS? The standard has a built-in answer: automatic fallback. If a recipient's device does not support RCS (old phone, unsupported carrier, RCS disabled), the message automatically downgrades to SMS. The rich card becomes a text with the same offer and a link.

You do not manage this process. You do not maintain separate lists. You send one message and the system delivers the best version each device can handle. As of early 2026, roughly 90-95% of US recipients receive the full RCS experience. The remaining 5-10% receive the SMS fallback (Google, 2025).

Zero delivery risk. The worst-case scenario is that a small percentage of your list gets exactly the same experience they would have gotten if you had sent SMS in the first place.

How Fallback Actually Works

Here is the technical flow:

1. You compose one RCS message (with images, buttons, carousels).
2. Your messaging provider sends it to the recipient's carrier.
3. If the carrier confirms the device supports RCS, the full rich message is delivered.
4. If the carrier reports no RCS support, the provider automatically generates an SMS version with the text content and a link.
5. You see delivery reporting for both paths in your analytics dashboard.

The entire process is invisible to you. You build one message. The infrastructure handles the rest.

What RCS Means for Different Local Business Types

The performance gains from RCS are not distributed evenly. Some business types benefit more than others based on how visual their product is and how much their customer journey depends on reducing friction.

Restaurants

Food is inherently visual. A photo of a beautifully plated dish, a craft cocktail, or a loaded brunch spread triggers a craving that no amount of text can replicate. RCS rich cards with reservation buttons convert at 15-25% CTR versus 3-6% for text-only specials (Sinch, 2025). For more strategies, see our restaurant retention playbook.

Med Spas

Med spas sell considered purchases at higher price points. Carousels that display multiple treatment options with before/after photos and pricing let customers compare and choose without visiting a website. The browse-and-book carousel format drives 3-5x more bookings than text-only messages for multi-service businesses (Infobip, 2025). Learn more about med spa client engagement.

Salons

A salon's portfolio is its most powerful sales tool. RCS carousels that showcase different stylists, signature looks, and starting prices turn a text message into a visual lookbook. Clients tap to book with the specific stylist whose work they like. For messaging templates, check out our salon client text templates.

Fitness Studios

Class schedules are painful to read in plain text. An RCS carousel with class photos, times, availability counts, and booking buttons makes the weekly schedule browsable and bookable in one swipe. Showing "3 spots left" creates urgency that a text-based class list cannot.

Dental and Medical Offices

Appointment-driven businesses see the biggest gains from suggested reply buttons. One-tap confirm/reschedule/cancel flows reduce no-shows by 25-35% versus text-based reminders (Google, 2024). That translates directly to recovered revenue.

The Timing Advantage

There is a window of opportunity for local businesses that adopt RCS before their competitors. Right now, the vast majority of business text messages are still plain SMS. An RCS message with a rich card, professional photo, and tappable buttons stands out dramatically in a customer's inbox simply because it is different from everything else.

This novelty effect will fade as more businesses adopt RCS. The early movers capture outsized engagement rates. This mirrors what happened with SMS marketing itself: the businesses that adopted it in the early 2010s saw extraordinary open and response rates. As the channel became crowded, those rates normalized.

The data supports this timing effect. Sinch reported in early 2025 that brands sending their first RCS campaigns saw engagement rates 40-60% above the channel average, likely because their customers had never received a rich message from a business before (Sinch, 2025). That novelty premium will not last forever.

Who Should Switch Now vs Wait

Switch Now If:

• You send promotional campaigns regularly. Weekly specials, seasonal offers, new product launches. The visual format of RCS will immediately boost your click-through rates.
• You rely on appointment confirmations and reminders. Suggested reply buttons ("Confirm" / "Reschedule") reduce no-shows and eliminate phone tag with your front desk.
• Your business is visual. Restaurants, med spas, salons, fitness studios, coffee shops. If your product or service photographs well, RCS is built for you.
• You already have an SMS list. You are not building a new channel. You are upgrading the one you already have.

Wait If:

• Your list is under 200 contacts. The absolute numbers may not justify the setup time yet. Build the list first, then upgrade the channel.
• Your current platform does not support RCS. Switching platforms is a bigger project. Check with your provider first. If they do not support RCS yet, plan the migration for next quarter.
• You only send transactional messages. If your texts are limited to order confirmations or shipping updates with no marketing component, the visual upgrade matters less. That said, even transactional messages benefit from suggested reply buttons for actions like "Track Order" or "Contact Support."

How to Get Started

If you decide to move forward, the process is straightforward:

1. Check your current SMS provider. Ask whether they support RCS Business Messaging. Major providers like Twilio, Sinch, Infobip, and Vonage already do.
2. Submit for verification. Your provider will guide you through Google's business verification process, which requires basic business documentation (name, address, website, logo). This typically takes 1-2 weeks.
3. Design your first RCS message. Start with your highest-performing SMS campaign and recreate it with a rich card or carousel. Add a compelling image and replace your URL with a tappable button.
4. A/B test against SMS. Send the RCS version to half your list and SMS to the other half. Measure CTR and conversions. The data will make the case for full adoption.
5. Roll out across all campaigns. Once you see the performance difference, expand RCS to your full messaging program. The SMS fallback ensures universal delivery during the transition.

The Bottom Line

SMS is not dying. It still works, and it will continue to work as a fallback and for simple transactional messages. But for marketing, promotions, and interactive customer communication, RCS is the clear upgrade: same inbox, richer experience, 3-7x higher engagement.

For a comprehensive look at what RCS can do for specific local business types, read the complete RCS guide for local businesses. To see how these engagement improvements translate into revenue for your business, try the retention calculator. And for industry-specific strategies, explore what works for restaurants, med spas, and salons.

Regulr is integrating RCS rich cards and carousels into its automated retention and re-engagement flows. Instead of plain-text win-back messages, your lapsed customers receive branded, tappable experiences that make coming back effortless. The combination of behavioral timing and rich messaging is the next evolution of local business retention.

Brian Boesen

Founder of Regulr and Denver Curated

I built Denver Curated into a local marketing platform reaching 300,000+ people across Denver, Austin, Chicago, and LA. Now I build retention technology at Regulr. I write about keeping customers because I have run the campaigns myself.