What's new vs Gifted Chat

Kept in sync with upstream react-native-gifted-chat's latest master, so you keep everything it already has - and the same IMessage model and prop names. Everything added here is non-breaking and opt-in; the media and recording features only activate once you install their optional peer deps.

Side-by-side comparison

Added in this fork	react-native-gifted-chat	@kesha-antonov/react-native-chat
Active maintenance	💤 sporadic	✅ active
Modern default UI (Telegram-inspired)	dated 2020 look	✅ modern, fully overridable
Light/Dark theme system	per-component color props	✅ theme / darkTheme tokens, runtime switch
Streaming (AI) messages	❌	✅ token-by-token + typing cursor
Emoji reactions	❌	✅ long-press picker + reaction pills
Swipe-to-reply + reply preview	❌	✅ built in
Video / audio messages	"not implemented, render your own"	✅ inline players + tappable fallback
Voice notes (hold-to-record + waveform)	❌	✅ optional, Telegram-style
Video messages (round camera notes)	❌	✅ optional, Telegram-style
Location messages	❌ ignored	✅ map card → opens system maps
Bubble tails + tighter message grouping	flat bubbles	✅

Theming in one line

Override any token, light and dark

// Modern defaults out of the box, or override any token (light + dark):
<Chat
  theme={{ colors: { accent: '#3390EC', outgoingBubble: '#EFFEDE' } }}
  darkTheme={{ colors: { background: '#0E1621' } }}
  {...props}
/>

Voice, video and location

Opt-in recording and media playback

<Chat
  audioRecording={{ isEnabled: true }}   // hold the mic to record a voice note (needs expo-audio)
  videoRecording={{ isEnabled: true }}   // record a video message (needs expo-image-picker)
  // location messages render automatically for any IMessage with a `location`
  {...props}
/>

# Optional inline media playback + recording:
npx expo install expo-video expo-audio expo-image-picker

Custom icons (e.g. Lucide)

Override any built-in icon

Built-in icons are the official Lucide glyphs, rendered via the optional react-native-svg peer when it is installed, or drawn with Views (no dependency) otherwise. Override any of them via the icons prop - the built-in icon is used for anything you don't override:

import { Send, Mic } from 'lucide-react-native'

<Chat
  icons={{
    send: ({ color, size }) => <Send color={color} size={size} />,
    mic:  ({ color, size }) => <Mic color={color} size={size} />,
  }}
  {...props}
/>

Overridable names: send, mic, camera, play, pause, check, checkAll, clock, pin, plus, close, chevronLeft, chevronDown, emoji, paperclip, reply, pencil, lock, trash.

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Using an AI coding agent? llms.txt is a condensed integration guide for agents adding this library to an app, and AGENTS.md covers working inside this repository.