Send RCS for Business with verified senders and rich cards.
Deliver order updates, promotions, and interactive carousels from a verified sender profile with your brand logo and checkmark. Customers can tap reply buttons right in their default messaging app on iOS and Android, with automatic SMS fallback when a phone does not support RCS.
Something good is on its way.
Your order is packed and ready. Follow its journey to your door.
Trusted by engineering and product teams
shipping at global scale.
Launch your verified RCS sender.
Register your brand across carriers and configure SMS fallback.
Customers ignore texts from unfamiliar numbers, and registering an RCS agent across mobile networks in multiple countries takes carrier approval for your brand logo, sender name, and business verification. Work with our team to get your verified sender profile approved across target carriers and configure automatic SMS fallback before you launch.
Contact SalesCode samples arrive when this API ships. The SDKs already cover the live channels.
Interactive messaging inside the phone's default inbox.
Turn plain texts into verified brand conversations with swipeable product carousels, suggested reply buttons, and automatic fallback to SMS.
- 01
Rich cards and carousels
Showcase products, boarding passes, or delivery updates with high-resolution images, descriptions, and up to four action buttons per card, or let customers swipe through a 10-card carousel.
- 02
Suggested reply buttons
Let customers confirm an appointment, choose a delivery window, or request support with a single tap on a reply chip.
- 03
Verified sender profiles
Display your company name, brand logo, colors, and verification checkmark at the top of the conversation so customers trust your messages right away.
- 04
Read receipts and typing indicators
See when a message is delivered and opened, and display a live typing indicator while your support team or AI agent prepares a response.
- 05
Automatic SMS fallback
Reach customers on iOS and Android even when a phone is offline or on a network without RCS support by automatically sending an SMS message.
- 06
Action buttons and structured replies
Open a package tracking page, dial a support line, or receive a structured webhook when a customer taps a button so your app can update their order right away.
- 07
High-resolution media and files
Send product videos up to 100MB, boarding pass PDFs, audio clips, and contact cards hosted by Bird with expiring signed links.
- 08
Two-way customer conversations
Receive free-form text replies and media from customers over signed webhooks using the same inbound message format as SMS and WhatsApp.
- 09
Device capability checks
Check whether a recipient's phone and mobile carrier support RCS before sending, and switch to SMS automatically when RCS is unavailable.
- 10
Unified multi-channel API
Send RCS, SMS, Email, WhatsApp, and Voice with one API key, shared webhook signatures, and consistent error handling across channels.
Reach and fallback
Send rich interactive cards with automatic SMS fallback in one API call.
RCS-capable phones on supported networks receive your verified brand header, rich media card, and quick-reply buttons, while other devices receive a clean SMS version generated from the same request. Built on Bird's ten years of direct carrier connectivity across 240 mobile networks, RCS is live today across major US carriers (T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T) and Brazil, with European and Asia-Pacific networks rolling out through 2026.
import { BirdClient } from "@messagebird/sdk";
const bird = new BirdClient({
apiKey: process.env.BIRD_API_KEY!,
});
const { data, error } = await bird.rcs.send({
to: "+15005550006",
card: {
title: "Your order has shipped",
subtitle: "Arriving Friday, May 22",
image: "https://cdn.example.com/orders/2891.jpg",
buttons: [
{
type: "url",
label: "Track package",
url: "https://example.com/track/2891",
},
{
type: "reply",
label: "Reschedule",
postback: "reschedule_2891",
},
],
},
fallback: "sms",
}).safe();
if (error) throw error;
console.log(data.id);
// → "rcs_4mP82wQ9..."
Track delivery, opens, button taps, and SMS fallbacks in real time.
Receive signed, replay-protected webhooks as messages are delivered, read, replied to, or routed over SMS fallback, using the same event structure across Bird channels.
Failed webhook deliveries retry at 5s, 5m, 30m, 2h, 5h, and twice at 10h. You can inspect failed deliveries and replay missed events from the dashboard or API.
rcs.queuedAccepted by Bird and queued for carrier delivery.rcs.sentHanded off to the recipient's mobile carrier.rcs.deliveredConfirmed delivered to the recipient's device.rcs.readOpened by the recipient with read receipts enabled.rcs.repliedCustomer tapped a reply button or sent a text response.rcs.fellbackRecipient device did not support RCS, so the SMS fallback was sent.rcs.failedDelivery failed permanently due to an invalid number or carrier rejection.
Upgrade existing SMS workflows to RCS without rebuilding your integration.
Use the same SDK client, authentication, and webhook handler you already run for SMS. Add rich cards and reply buttons for RCS-capable phones while keeping text delivery as a built-in fallback.
RCS with SMS fallback.
Deliver an interactive order update with a tracking link and reschedule button, and fall back to a plain text message when RCS is unavailable.
Direct SMS.
Send plain text messages for one-time passcodes and simple alerts using the same client, authentication, and delivery webhooks.
Pay per delivered message with transparent carrier pass-through fees.
You pay per delivered RCS message, with carrier rich-messaging fees passed through as clear line items on your invoice. Messages that fall back to SMS are billed at the standard SMS rate for the destination country, with no platform or per-seat fees.
Put it into practice.
Continue with the documentation, guides and examples for this topic.
Start sending verified RCS messages.
Talk to our team about registering your branded sender profile, checking carrier coverage in your target markets, and setting up automatic SMS fallback.