This app is ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLE if you're going to force us to use this app at least make it user friendly & somewhat close to the Verizon + messaging app, how do you even create a group text w/o each response going out to each individual recipient & not THE group as a whole, the list is so long of horrible this app is, til there isn't enough room & space to type it all. I hate it & on behalf of the Android community we all do, what is being done to accommodate your customers for messaging because this Google Messaging app AIN'T IT!
You want to send a group text, go into the messages settings by tapping your initial/avatar at the top right, select messages settings, scroll down to advanced settings, tap on group text and select group text, which will send all texts and responses to all participants. Right now it sounds like it's set to mass text which will send to each participant individually and get individual responses that come only to you.
You are free to use another messaging app, but eventually you will have to come back to Google. Verizon killed their own app, and that's not on Samsung. If there are things you want improved in Google messages, the Google forums are the place to go. Samsung has nothing to do with Google's messaging app, other than that they decided to do like Verizon and stop supporting their own app. The only difference is Verizon outright killed it and Samsung put theirs on life support.
Google messaging doesn't want other message apps tp be the default it seems. I can't replace their icon on the main screen either. Google messages will delete all messages after (70 days?) unless you upgrade to their Cloud storage service. I just hate being forced to do stuff, good as it may be.
It's absolutely not true that Google will delete messages after 70 days. I have been using Google messages since it's inception, and I have messages more than 15 years old. Google has never deleted a single message that I did not myself delete. I do not subscribe to any paid cloud service from Google. If you think that's true, download SMS Backup and Restore from the Play store and set it to back up your messages on a schedule.
Also, if you are not being allowed to make any other messaging app your default, that's probably a carrier decision if you have a carrier locked phone.
I've never had issues with group texts and they work even better with RCS utilized with iPhone users. I think you need to review your Google Messages settings as another had noted.
