We know a picture is worth a thousand words and now you can tell a better story and significantly increase click-through rates by including an image in your outbound Mobile Push messages.

If you’ve set up Mobile Push on iOS and Android, you can enable rich push messages by following these two easy steps:

Step 1: Upgrade mobile SDK

To send rich push messages you’ll need to be on the following Intercom mobile SDKs (or higher):

  • Android - Version 12.3.0+

  • iOS - Version 12.3.0+

You can find out more about installing and upgrading Intercom mobile SDK here.

Note: If you don’t have the compatible version of Intercom mobile SDK, you can still send push messages but the image uploader in the Mobile Push composer will be disabled.

Step 2: iOS Push Integration to enable rich push on iOS devices

There’s an additional integration you’ll need to send rich push messages on iOS devices. Follow the developer doc for this integration here.

Compose a rich push message

To start composing your rich push message, go to Outbound > Mobile Push > New mobile push:

Then select from the templates or start from scratch with your own push message. In this example, we’ll use the “Alert users to a sale” template to get started quickly.

Compose your message

Compose your push message by clicking inside the message preview on screen to start editing the text:

Upload an image

Now you can upload an image to make it a rich push message. Simply click “Upload file” to choose an image from your device.

Note: A Mobile Push sent with an image will only be sent to customers on versions of your app supporting Intercom mobile SDK 12.3.0+. For customers on older versions, your Mobile Push will be delivered as text-only.

Image Specifications

  • File type - Only upload static images (JPEG/PNG), any other file types such as GIF, PDF, MP3, MP4, etc. are currently not supported.

  • Size - Maximum file size is 10MB.

  • Recommended aspect ratio - Use an aspect ratio of approximately 2:1 for best presentation on both iOS and Android devices.

  • Recommended dimensions: For small images use 512 x 256 pixels, for large images use 1024 x 512 pixels.

If using portrait images:

  • On iOS - Rich images will scale to fit the screen on the active or locked view.

  • On Android - Rich images will be auto-cropped to the center in landscape. They will span the full width of the notification, and the height will adjust accordingly.

Pro Tips:

  • To ensure important information in your image isn’t cropped and displays nicely across different devices, use an aspect ratio of 2:1 and position content in the center of the image (not around the edges).

  • Avoid transparent background images which can respond unexpectedly for light and dark mode device settings.

  • Test your rich push message by setting it live on your different test devices (especially different Android devices) to make sure it’s appearing as you intended.

  • Read the Apple and Google Android documentation for more guidance.

Preview

When you upload an image from your device, it’ll automatically show in the Mobile Push preview. You can see how this rich push message will appear in the notification panel in two states:

Default (collapsed):

Expanded:

You can also preview how this rich push message will appear on both Android and iOS devices by toggling the option shown below:

Note: Actual rendering of rich push messages may vary from the preview on different devices depending on device aspect ratio, Android version, OEM-specific constraints, etc. It’s best to send it to different test devices and make sure you’re happy with how it looks. 👍

Set Mobile Push live

Now you’re ready to send your rich push message. You can use all the same functionality of Mobile Push such as audience targeting, goals, custom data attributes, deep linking, reporting and more. Learn more about sending mobile push messages here.

Pro Tip: Easily test how a rich push message uplifts conversion (open rates or click-through rates) by scheduling the same push message with and without an image using A/B Testing and then checking the open rates for each variant.

Important:

  • Customers must be on a version of your app running Intercom SDK 12.3.0 or higher.

  • Customers who don’t meet the above condition may be able to receive a text-only version of the same push message.

  • For more information, refer to the documentations on Intercom iOS SDK and Intercom Android SDK.

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