messages does not work with macos Ventura

Very frustrated with this. Messages stopped working on my new MBA (M2). Works on my school computer, phone, and Watch fine. Called Apple support. No solution. Tried zapping PRAM. After doing that, the Messages window did open, but then closed immediately and prompted me to login. It's during login that I get an error message. Come on, Apple, do better than this! Is it perhaps Handoff related?

Messages doesn't work since latest update. I have reviewed my settings and internet connection and restarted my laptop.

I'm having this exact same issue, which is how I found this thread. In fact, I'm having several random buggy issues on my laptop since upgrading - and it's not my computer because it's a 2021 M1 Max with plenty of RAM and HD space. One of the most annoying is that my computer sees there are upgrades to the OS, but when I try to access them (in case they fix the SMS and other issues) I get the spinning beach ball of death. I think there are some bugs in Ventura still to be worked out, unfortunately.

I have tried that several times but Messages.app still crashes on startup on my Venture-based M1X Mac.

I sincerely hope people don't believe that the case is now closed on this issue. Glad some people have gotten it to work, but there are additional, unresolved bugs.

Messages.app works fine on my older Mac with the same iPhone (12 Max0. The problem is not with the phone.

Thank you so much for your detailed reply. At some point, I will probably end up doing this. Early on in the OSX upgrades, I always did clean installs. But later I did not since things seemed to work fine without. It probably is the new file structure creating such issues. But for now, nearly all other things are working fine. I don't want to spend too much time on this. Is there anyway to just download the Messages and FaceTime packages for installation? Presuming not. Will probably reinstall later from recovery mode as you suggested.

Just upgraded to a new MBP and Ventura myself and was having this problem. Thanks for the tip!

You got it!

Yep, that’s the one

EnFuego that fixed it for me. Thanks!

Did not solve for me. Glad it helped some people. Why is Apple not making this a higher priority?

this is it!!

I am glad that some people have gotten relief. I tried the steps with great hope, but it is NOT "it" for me. Messages.app continues to crash upon launch on Ventura.

I have an iMac, running Ventura. Messages works on some but not all of my contacts. Very annoying.

Thanks, Nestor. The problem is I cannot log into Messages or FaceTime on my new MBA running Ventura. So forwarding is not even shown as an option in iOS.