Dirk's Metric/k

documenting work of a young doctor and the world this happens in

activating iMessage service on iOS5

12 Comments Posted by Dirk on October 13, 2011

Apple released iOS5 yesterday. The update process was not as smooth as I expected – I couldn’t restore my backup from version 5 to version 5 completely. In essence, all media except the photos were lost. Another thing where iOS5 is not smooth is the activation of the iMessage service. At least for me, it kept displaying “waiting for activation”. The trick that made things work:

Go to Settings > Messages
Open the Receive At Settings
Enter a new e-mail address
A verification mail is sent to that e-mail address, open it, click on the link and verify the address by entering your Apple ID
Now, this does not finish the process yet
Go to Settings > Messages > Receive At
The e-mail address you just entered will still show verifiying.
Tap the e-mail address again and tap on Resend
Now your iMessage account is activated, pick the right CallerID and you are ready to send messages.

Computer life, Tutorials activation, iMessage, iOS5, problems

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12 Responses to activating iMessage service on iOS5

iloveyou2 October 14, 2011 at 2:52 am
what if i dont have the option of receives at?

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- Scarecrow12w October 15, 2011 at 6:15 pm
  me too
  I don’t have the option either
  
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hongchingchong October 17, 2011 at 1:33 am
where’s recive at?

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- Dirk October 28, 2011 at 11:37 am
  only on ios5, in settings > messages > the 4th item (iMessage has to be switched on)
  
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guru November 13, 2011 at 2:55 am
once you switch imessage service ON, it starts showing the message “waiting for activation”. THere is not sign of entering email ID. once it is activated only then you can change or add email ID….. now can we have a solution on activation?

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K.D November 14, 2011 at 7:53 am
Mine says ‘email’ next tot he email address i added. i haven’t received any emails for verification but it still says ‘waiting for activation’ on the previous screen. does it matter if i’m using jailbroken/unlocked iPhone?

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- Annie January 2, 2012 at 6:21 am
  yeah mine too. I didn’t received any email from verification after I added the email. and it says “waiting for activation” too. did you get it to work?
  
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caitlyn December 8, 2011 at 6:25 am
Mine says “waiting for activation…….” and it doesn’t say “recieve at” anywhere on the entire screen.

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Shery December 13, 2011 at 2:32 am
I went through the process, but how and where to pick the Caller ID. Don’t see that option anywhere.

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kratungpay December 18, 2011 at 2:45 pm
thanks, really meant a lot… helps a lot, thx again

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soccerislife8 January 5, 2012 at 11:13 pm
I had problems activating iMessage and I followed the guide posted here. http://imbyter.com/2012/01/cannot-activate-imessage/

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- Dirk January 5, 2012 at 11:47 pm
  Thank you for this link. It is an “interesting” solution, but apparently Apple did strange things with iMessage…
  
  Reply