iOS 18 to allow text effects for individual words in iMessage

Get ready to jazz up your iMessages. According to a MacRumors story citing “multiple sources familiar with the matter,” iOS 18 is going to take the fun text effects a step further by allowing you to add text effects to individual words within the message.

It is not clear if these will be the same text effects currently available to entire messages, entirely new ones (like bold or italics), or something else entirely. You can already add a handful of fun effects to your iMessages. There are full-screen effects like balloons, lasers, and confetti, or text effects like slam or invisible ink. Those text effects apply to your entire message, though.

Messages in iOS 18 is expected to get quite an upgrade with RCS support allowing for much better communication with Android phones, AI-powered autocomplete features, and maybe even custom AI-generated emojis. It’s not clear if these text effects will apply only to iMessages or will work with RCS messages as well, but Apple is incentivized to continue making iMessage a more full-featured and desirable alternative to the “green bubbles,” even if Android users can send messages that are more advanced that the current SMS ones.

We’ll learn about all the changes coming to Messages in iOS 18 and macOS 15 at WWDC in June.