How Much Does RCS Messaging Cost in 2025 for Businesses?

RCS business messaging traffic is expected to reach 50 billion messages worldwide in 2025, which is a 50% increase from 2024 (Juniper Research). Businesses are quickly adopting messaging apps, a next-generation messaging technology, to improve customer experience, engagement, and brand trust and facilitate seamless communication.

But when more people start using messaging services, the primary question is how much money they need for it and how to get the most out of RCS with the right messaging partner, such as a reliable service provider.

Using real 2025 pricing examples and a data-driven approach, we break down the exact RCS messaging cost in this post so that your company can efficiently budget and maximize the returns on your RCS campaigns. So let’s begin.

In fact, rich communication services RCS are a step up from traditional short message service SMS messaging. It converts regular text messages into a branded, interactive way for businesses and customers to talk to each other, enhancing the experience with multimedia content, including high resolution images.

RCS has some advantages over SMS:

• Read receipts: Make it easy for businesses to know when a customer has received messages, enabling timely follow-ups and improving communication efficiency.
• Branding: Allow companies to display their verified business name and logo, helping to establish trust and credibility with recipients.
• Rich media: Lets businesses include images, videos, carousels, and interactive buttons in their messages. This transforms standard outreach into engaging, interactive messaging experiences that drive user action, creating branded messages.
• Two-way interaction: Enables real-time, conversational messaging between businesses and customers, making it ideal for smooth transactions, quick support, and post-purchase engagement.

All things considered, rich communication services or RCS are an advanced way to send messages through supported devices, unlike traditional sms since they combine the features of chat apps with the reach of SMS.

How much is RCS messaging pricing per message in 2025?

An RCS message has no set global cost. RCS pricing depends on a wide range of interconnected factors, agreements with mobile carriers, local regulations, message type, volume, and infrastructure costs. It is crucial to understand how RCS pricing works.

Pricing Tiers

The price of RCS messages depends on what kind of communication you send. Below are the main price levels, each with its own set of features and uses to help you design your campaign.

1. Basic RCS Messages

• Definition: These are 160-character text messages that come with delivery/read receipts, branding, and a confirmed sender.
• Use Case: Simple notifications, OTPs, and appointment reminders.

2. Rich Media Single RCS Messages

• Definition: Messages with more than 160 characters or that include rich media, including buttons, carousels, pictures, videos, and suggested answers, are referred to as single RCS messages.
• Use Case: Selling campaigns, interactive promotions, and customer onboarding, and promotional messages.

3. Conversational RCS

• Definition: You pay for each session, which usually lasts 24 hours. The first message is billed as Basic or Single; subsequent messages are often free or low cost.
• Use Case: Customer support chats, post-purchase assistance, and service queries and group chats.

Disclaimer: These statistics may be very different from the expected ranges for 2025, depending on your CPaaS provider, mobile network operator, message volume, and specific features implemented.

A step-by-step guide to RCS budget planning

You can't figure out your RCS messaging budget only by knowing your per-message rate. It means having a strategic understanding of the goals, business needs, and communication demands of your campaign. Use this simple, feasible structure to quickly figure out how much your RCS messaging services costs might be and prepare for the best return on investment, ensuring cost efficiency.

Step 1: Determine your message volume and frequency

First, decide on how many texts you plan to send monthly. Look at your current messages delivered or text data to set a baseline. Next, think about how big your current consumer base is.

1. The size of your existing customer base.
2. In six to twelve months, the numbers will likely grow
3. Seasonal or promotional peaks, such as holiday sales, Black Friday, or annual events.

Step 2: Choose your message types and mix

Divide your intended text only messages and other messaging into three RCS levels:

• Basic RCS for short, text-based alerts or OTPs.
• Single RCS for interactive alerts, marketing campaigns, or promotions.
• Conversational RCS sessions for customer service, sales support, or post-purchase assistance.

Depending on your communication objectives, give each type, including interactive elements, a percentage. For example:

• 50% Basic (OTP, confirmations),
• 40% Single (promotional offers, product updates),
• 10% Conversational (customer support, FAQs).

Step 3: Identify your target markets & regions

Where your recipients live is sometimes the biggest cost factor. RCS charges differ depernding on the area because of carrier agreements and market factors.

• Write down the names of the countries or locations you want to reach the most.
• Check their specific per-message or per-session rates.
• If your campaigns are global, account for any cross-border delivery fees.

Step 4: Account for additional costs & fees

The cost per message is not the only thing that matters in RCS messaging. It usually includes:

• One-time setup fees: Frequently assessed when setting up an integration or enabling RCS.
• Brand verification fees: For branding and trust indicators, you must register your verified business profile with carriers.
• Monthly platform fees: CPaaS providers charge you to keep your dashboard access and account active.
• Premium feature costs: There may be additional monthly or per-use costs for sophisticated AI integrations, chatbot flows, analytics dashboards, or CRM connectors.

Step 5: When you draw up a budget, think about other things.

1. Fallback to SMS: You can send the message as a regular SMS or MMS if the person you sent it to doesn't have a device or service that supports RCS. Ask your provider how much this will cost.

2. Charged on Delivery/Read: In most cases, you only have to pay for messages that are successfully sent to the carrier or, in certain models, when the user reads them. Get your provider to explain this billing incident.

3. Longer Messages are Single Charge: A long RCS text message is billes as one fee (within the Single RCS tier). This differs from SMS, which breaks messages into segments of more than 160 characters and charges for each segment.

Monthly RCS budget calculation example

Here is a practical example of figuring out a monthly RCS messaging budget based on message volume, type mix, and average rates to help you see how these expenses add up in real life.

Company X (North America) wants to send 100,000 RCS messages every month:

• 60% Basic: 60,000 × $0.01 = $600
• 30% Single: 30,000 × $0.02 = $600
• 10% Conversational: 10,000 × $0.04 = $400
• Estimated Platform/Verification Fees: $50

Total Estimated Monthly Cost: $1,650

Disclaimer: This is a simplified example. Final costs depend on your provider, negotiated rates, and exact usage.

Cost reduction strategies for RCS campaigns

RCS has advanced messaging features and functions, but the RCS costs can add up quickly. Companies may use these tried-and-true methods to lower the costs of their RCS campaigns without losing loyalty or performance, which is crucial for engaging customers.

• Volume discounts: For larger message volumes, bargain for reduced prices.
• Optimal message type selection: When rich media is not needed, use Basic.
• Strategic geographic targeting: Prioritize regions with lower RCS rates.
• Provider negotiation: Partner with providers like DecisionTelecom for favorable rates.
• Leveraging conversational pricing: Use the 24-hour support window to lower the cost of each message.
• A/B testing: Make material as engaging as possible while keeping costs down per conversion.

Factors that increase RCS costs

RCS messaging is a great way for businesses to talk to each other through mobile devices and messaging apps, but there are a lot of things that can make your monthly bills go up a lot. Knowing about these can help you stay on budget and avoid unexpected charges.

1. Premium Features and Advanced Integrations

Using advanced features like AI chatbots, advanced analytics dashboards, or bespoke workflow integrations often costs extra each month or each time you use them.

2. Cross-Border Messaging

For example, sending RCS messages to people in other countries frequently costs more in terms of connection and carrier fees. International campaigns should include these extra costs in their budgets so that they don't underestimate how much money they need.

3. Low-Volume Messaging Tiers

If your organization only transmits a few hundred RCS messages a month, you can be in a higher per-message rate category. Low-volume campaigns cost more per message because many providers offer lower prices to people who send a lot of messages.

4. One-Time Setup and Brand Verification Fees

In order to activate branded sender IDs and trust indicators, companies must register and validate their brand profile with carriers prior to initiating RCS campaigns. Depending on your provider and location, this procedure frequently involves one-time setup or verification fees.

Tactics to optimize RCS messaging costs for maximum ROI

By actively pushing several strategic levers across multiple channels, businesses can improve their performance and lower their RCS pricing by a huge amount. These key features are the greatest ways to get the most out of your campaigns and get the most out of your money.

1. Message type optimization: Only use rich content when it significantly increases value and encourages the intended consumer action. Rich media should be saved for interactive campaigns that warrant the higher expenditure, while basic RCS messages are more economical for straightforward alerts or OTPs.
2. Planning and forecasting volume: By properly predicting how many messages you'll send and how often, you may avoid unexpected overages and get better rates per message by taking advantage of volume discounts. Work with your supplier to get the best possible pricing based on precise estimates.
3. Creating relevant audience segments: To prevent sending out irrelevant blanket broadcasts, divide your audience into groups based on their behavior, purchasing history, or demographics. Targeted advertising gets more individuals to click on them, which lowers your cost per conversion and boosts your overall return on investment.
4. Doing A/B testing: Try out different message layouts, calls to action, immersive media features, and wording to see which ones get the most people to engage with the least amount of money. Ongoing optimization based on test results makes campaigns more effective over time.
5. Automating message flows and integrating with CRM: To guarantee that messages are timely, pertinent, and customized, integrate RCS messaging with your CRM and automation platforms. This will cut down on manual labor and lower the possibility of sending inefficient broadcasts that waste money.
6. Having a clear fallback strategy: Recognize the financial effects of using SMS or MMS as a backup when recipients don't have RCS enabled. Create templates for backup messaging and include blended cost models in your budget projections.
7. Setting up alerts and spending caps: Make use of provider tools to set stringent budget caps, track campaign expenditures in real-time, and get notifications when spending reaches thresholds. This keeps track of money and stops unexpected spending.
8. Monitoring Cost per Engagement or Conversion: Instead of merely the cost of each message, focus more on the cost of getting the results you want, such as clicks, sign-ups, or purchases. This keeps track of money and prevents extra expenditure.
9. Periodic Pricing Reviews and Provider Audits: To make sure you are receiving the best deals, periodically examine your provider's pricing structure and contrast it with that of its rivals. Audits may uncover unstated costs or chances for contract renegotiation.
10. Performance-Based Budget Adjustments: Allocate more budget to campaigns, message types, or segments that consistently deliver high ROI, while reducing spend on low-performing areas. This dynamic budgeting approach maximizes returns.
11. Using Verified Sender IDs: Use a verified sender ID to develop trust in your brand and make sure your communications get delivered. This will boost engagement rates and lower expenses by preventing wasted messages and spam complaints.

With your reliable messaging partner DecisionTelecom, you can send optimized RCS messaging campaigns for your business

RCS pricing depends on the type of message, the region, and the provider's agreements. You can get the most out of your RCS investments, using international RCS, by optimizing your strategy for sending multiple messages using the correct mix of optimization tactics.

Leverage DecisionTelecom’s RCS messaging solutions to launch interactive, high-engagement campaigns tailored to your business goals, offering competitive pricing.

FAQs

1. How much does RCS technology cost per message?

RCS pricing models range from $0.0075-$0.015 for Basic messages like OTPs and $0.012-$0.03 for multimedia content messages, varying by region and provider. The price varies depending on how many messages you send, what kind of communication you use, and what you agree on with the carrier.

2. Is RCS messaging more expensive than SMS?

Although RCS usually costs 20–50% more per message, it is more cost-effective per conversion because it generates engagement rates that are three to six times higher.

Explore our complete RCS vs. SMS comparison for deeper insights.

3. What factors affect RCS messaging pricing?

Message type, volume, location, carrier agreements, and provider markup all affect RCS pricing.

4. Does RCS work on iPhones in 2025?

Indeed.Apple will support RCS in iOS across numerous carriers and regions globally by the end of 2024 or early 2025.

5. Can I send both marketing and transactional messages with RCS?

Yes, this is one of the key strengths of RCS.

• For Marketing: Use Single (Rich Media) RCS to send interactive product carousels, promotional videos, and offers with direct call-to-action buttons.
• For Transactional Messages: For shipping confirmations, appointment reminders, and secure, branded, and verifiable OTPs, as well as delivery and read receipts, use Basic RCS.