iMessage not working on Big Sur

How on Earth can you call this a Christmas Miracle? You erased your main user account, created a new account (started from scratch) and lost all the data from your main account? That's not a miracle, its suicide for anyone with massive amounts of user-localized data! NOT a fix!

All I can say DJLW is if it worked for him then it is a fix. Everyone has to assess the impact of their actions. I did it too because I don't have my life on my devices except my MacBook so not to worry.

I contacted Apple after I tried many of the fixes listed here. My "FIX" was that I was told imessage is no longer an app. It is now just called Messages. Nothing is different except you have to "two finger swipe" to delete (which was apparently enabled in imessage, I just did not know). However, I did not have trouble sending or receiving messages, so this might not be the answer for you if that is your case. Just wanted to help those who were searching for the lost "imessage app". Good luck to all.

I solved it by signing out of iCloud on my Big Sur iMac

Restarted holding SHIFT.

Restart from Big Sur drive.

Sign into iCloud.

iMessages began sending and receiving my tests.

I saw in this process Big Sur system post an error message, but I lost the error message. There was no error # on it. I can't remember the exact wording.

i went to getsupport.apple.com and just messaged them and told them my problem and it ended up being that my my facetime and messages account had been banned so they just un banned it and within minutes it was solved.

I had this issue as well after the OS was updated to Big Sur. Now it is finally solved.

I contacted the Apples support online chat, they're helpful but help is quite limited because the issue remained after trying their troubleshooting attempts. They advised me to do the following,

1) Create another admin account on mac.

2) Log into the new account and try to sign in message and facetime.

3) Because the issue persisted, they advised me to reinstall the OS.

4) System reinstall was not successful because it says "The volume can't be downgraded."

Then the online chat group scheduled a session for further assistance.

Apple called me thereafter and they found that my apple ID was reported as Spam and thus not functional on imessage and facetime. They removed me from the spam list and restarted my mac and IT WORKED!

So the solution is simple, reach out to the senior Apple support group and they can fix this. Hopefully, it helps.

This happened to me on my MacBook Pro but just today after doing the Big Sur 11.2.1 update. UGH! Apple support has had me launch from safe mode, reset SMC and reset NVRAM. I tried all the Apple ID things everyone suggested and nothing works. They also said nothing is wrong with my account. They want me to reinstall the MacOS but I'm seeing some have tried it with no success. WTH Apple!?

Hi relon7979,

I know what the problem is. Please call them again, ask them to transfer you to a senior customer support. Then tell him/her that you AppleID was probably flagged as spam ID by mistake and they can unblock it from the server side. There is nothing wrong with the computer.

It will solve your problem. So many people have the same issue.

Thanks so much, I’ll contact them! I saw someone else said they created another user so I tried that and my iMessage works perfectly fine on the new user. I told that to the 4th rep I spoke to and they still want me to reinstall the OS!

After contacting someone in senior support we got iMessages working without reinstalling the OS! I was going to share the steps we took but I can't pull up the transcript for some reason. It had something to do with the startup files on my user account. She had me delete all login items from my user and delete or group many files from different system folders. If you're not having luck, insist on a senior rep!

Now I'm more worried about it... sadly my MacBook Pro 16 inch doesn't have any software support from apple in my country (Colombia) I only have hardware support and I can't access to support page for my device and this is weird because I actually have support for my iPad Pro 2018 12 inches (both bought new on the same apple retail store Mac Center Colombia).... so as far I could see I would start to say good bye to iMessage on my MacBook Pro ... very bad thing....

Exactly the same for me, I called to apple support and they fix it in a couple minutes.

can you share what they did to solve it please.

Do you remember what they did to fix it?

I was told to restart my Mac and it worked!