Can't Sign in to iMessage or Facetime on iPad

TidBITS Talk
1

Three days ago I went to my iPad to use iMessage and discovered a sign in screen. I tried to sign in and got the message: “iMessage Activation An error occurred during activation. Try again.” This problem has persisted ever since. I can still use iMessage on my iPhone and Mac. All the standard support recommendations (e.g., restart, check your Internet connection, force quite iMessage, check password and so on) didn’t work. One common recommendation is to go to Settings>iMessage and turn it off and on again but I can’t do that because all I get is a sign in screen.

So I thought I would try to sign out of and then back into iCloud. Unfortunately, now I can’t sign back into icloud. I get a “Could not communicate with the server” error. There are no obvious network problems and other devices on the same network work just fine.

I have no idea what else to try.

2

And recently I can’t use FaceTime any more on my Mac, though it’s OK on my phone. Having a similar problem with FantastiCal. Not a newbie, tried everything.

3

What version iPad? I’ve encountered this on one of my oldest iPads (and haven’t solved it either)

4

iPad Air (3rd generation)

5

Be sure to always check Apple - Support - System Status as it might not be a local issue. Just FYI. Best, Patrick

6

At this point I might try either putting the iPad into Recovery mode and try doing an iPadOS update from a computer (see If you can't update or restore your iPad - Apple Support), or simply factory reset the iPad and restore from backup, and then see if you can log in to iCloud.

7

My sister ran into this issue persistently on her iPad a few years ago. Apple has a support article on the general topic, but in the end, none of the steps in the article fixed the problem, so she needed to contact Apple Support directly to resolve it.

It turned out the issue was something at Apple, and it was quickly addressed once verified. Evidently, it was not exactly a frequent issue, but it was common enough that Apple had a procedure in place for handling it.

Edited: I couldn’t find the support article I recalled seeing when my sister had trouble, but this one is close:

1 Like
8

I thought about this, and may try it, but the project showed up from one day to the next without me actually even using the iPad. Of course, there are always things going on in the back ground. Thanks

9

This was my first guess. However, everything still works on my iPhone and Mac and the system status page showed everything was find whenever I checked. Thanks.

10

This sounds hopeful. I will see if I can find someone at Apple who knows what is going on. Thanks.

11

Contacted Apple. Chat, then a conversation, then second level support, then the Apple store. Nobody could fix it. They recommended wiping the iPad and starting from scratch. They also recommended not restoring from backup in case the problem was related to the back up.

I now have a working iPad but it is a real pain to set it up from scratch. There was very little data loss but logging back into everything and setting up all my apps the way I like them is a real pain.

Anybody know if it is possible to restore selectively from iCloud backup for an individual app?

12

I feel your pain. Apple’s iCloud services have all kinds of ways of tripping over their own shoelaces. It doesn’t help that FaceTime/iMessage sometimes want to be logged in separately.

1 Like