Google Messages Gets Long Press Menu Overhaul and Copy Option
After Samsung Messages officially shut down, Google Messages is likely the only popular texting app for Android. While it offers important features like RCS support and end-to-end encryption, it has lacked two basic yet crucial capabilities. Fortunately, these have been spotted in the app's beta build and could be added soon.
Google Messages Gets Long Press Menu Overhaul and Copy Option
The long press menu in Google Messages is currently not user-friendly. Upon long-pressing a message, you initially see an emoji pill and Photomoji, followed by four action buttons at the top: copy, delete, star, and a three-dots button. Tapping the three-dots opens an additional menu with reply, share, forward, and view details options. This requires multiple steps to access basic actions like reply, share, and forward.
However, the new Google Messages update changes this. In the latest version, long-pressing a message opens a new menu containing all essential action buttons. A blur effect has been added to the background, giving a more modern look. The emoji bar still appears upon long-pressing a message, with no changes.
This feature was first spotted in January, available only to a few testers. Now, it's widely available on almost every device enrolled in the latest Google Messages beta build, such as the Pixel 10 with version 20260803_03_RCO0.
The next thing users would like to see in Google Messages is improved functionality, such as:
- Themes and customization like WhatsApp
- Effects and reactions like iMessage
- Advanced chat tools like Telegram
- Google Messages is great the way it is
The biggest problem with Google Messages is the inability to select a particular part of a message for copying. For instance, in the message "Hey, this is Aman from PhoneArena," you can't select and copy "from PhoneArena." The workaround is to copy the entire message, paste it, and then manually delete the unnecessary part.
Google has apparently realized the need for this basic feature and is working on it. With the long press menu overhaul and copy option addition, Google Messages is getting closer to being a truly functional messaging app.