Leaked Images Suggest iMessage for Android Is a Possibility, But Will Likely Never Happen – Here’s Why

Leading up to the highly anticipated keynote speech at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) earlier this year, we reported on a (since debunked) rumor that Apple might be preparing an official release of its renowned iMessage messaging platform on the Android mobile operating system.

Of course, you and I both know that the show came and went without so much as a mention about this rumored “bombshell” revelation. And while Apple has persisted to further break down the barriers between the iOS and Android platforms, there still remains no evidence that Apple will ever be releasing an iMessage client for Google’s OS.

To be fair, however, sources have indicated that Cupertino has at least entertained the idea of bringing iMessage to Android before. John Gruber of Daring Fireball shared with AppleInsider earlier this week, for instance, that a variety of mockups have circulated within the higher echelons of Apple’s R&D department — a litany of screenshots in which the iMessage application is emulated in an Android-consistent OS ‘material design’.

Despite the apparent entertainment of the idea, in whatever context or to whatever extent, however, Gruber also cautioned that a functional release of Apple’s popular messaging platform on Android may never actually happen. Instead, Gruber pointed to the alleged internal circulations not as a revelation of things forthcoming, but of things possible from a cross-platform software standpoint.

Gruber then proceeded to reflect on the 2010 comments made by Apple’s late co-founder, Steve Jobs, in which the iconic tech luminary promised consumers that Apple’s FaceTime video messaging service would one day become an open standard. Of course, as you and I know, and as Gruber points out, that never happened — primarily in light of some extraneous complications surrounding Apple’s use of the FaceTime platform, such as recent patent litigation between the Silicon Valley tech-giant and VirnetX, for example. Gruber noted that although Apple had internally sought to one day make Steve’s vision a reality, these circumstances ultimately thwarted those efforts and kept FaceTime an Apple exclusive.

“So I don’t think we’re ever actually going to see FaceTime as an open standard,” Gruber said. “But I think the sentiment that drove Jobs to want it to be an open standard applies to the idea of releasing iMessage for Android. Apple doesn’t need to rely on platform-exclusive lock-in.”

Apple has, however, released other ‘Cupertino exclusive’ apps for the Android platform. Just last year, for instance, Apple took the wraps off a custom Android-inspired Apple Music app for Google’s platform. So while it may appear that Apple is at least warming up to the possibility of expanding some of its features to the Android platform, Cupertino, first and foremost, probably wants to maintain at least some element of exclusivity — you know, the kind capable of attracting millions of new users to its iOS platform every year — right?

What do you think about iMessage on the Android platform? Let us know in the comments! 

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