Google Messages emoji bug is making chats frustrating

The Google Messages emoji bug is driving people nuts right now. Thanks to this weird behavior, the emoji reaction panel pops open every time you open a chat where the last message was an image.

This started showing up for users running the beta build (20250406_01_RC00). On stable versions, like 20250326_00_RC04, things seem normal for now. Android Police reports that they’ve seen it on beta devices, and Reddit users are complaining too. So yeah, it’s not just you.

What makes it worse is that the panel keeps showing up no matter what you do. Force-closing the app? It’s still there. Clearing the cache? Doesn’t help. Rebooting your phone? Nope. The moment you open that image-based chat, the emoji panel pops up.

Sure, accidentally tapping a random emoji isn’t the end of the world. You can always change your reaction later. But the real problem is the extra step—you’ve got to tap out of the panel every time manually. It breaks the flow and slows you down.

For now, the only way to stop it is by sending or receiving another text message in that chat. Sadly, unless you switch to the stable channel, there’s no real fix. It’s unclear if this is just an annoying bug or some weird early experiment to boost reaction usage. We’ve asked Google for answers, and we’ll update this post when we hear back.