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How do I fix "Unable to contact iMessage server. Try again." message?

I am getting an "Unable to contact iMessage server. Try again." message on my iPad. Anyone else? Is there a fix or is the server just swamped.

iPad 2, Windows 7

Posted on Oct 13, 2011 5:02 AM

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26 replies

Jun 23, 2017 12:10 PM in response to rednival

This was happening to me, too. I was on the road, and tried to sign out and back in under Settings > Messages, but it wouldn't let me. The login form went gray and I couldn't do anything. After a minute or so a message would pop up ("Unable to contact..."). I tried it from home with the same result. I read this post, restarted my iPhone, did the same process, and a message popped up on my computer asking me if it was okay for a device to use my email for Messages. I agreed, and now Messages on my phone is working properly again.

Oct 13, 2011 5:22 AM in response to rednival

Ah yes, I had this. And yes it does frustrate you.

I can tell you what I did and hopefully it helps:

I just logged in until the message popped up, and then closed it and selected my region, I did this with a Wi-fi connection by the way, and It kept coming up with the same message, until I just kept signing in, and at the 4th try it worked.


All I can say is keep trying?

Oct 25, 2012 2:13 PM in response to rednival

Is anyone at apple reading this. This has been happening since I updated my useless ipad to IOS 6 about a month ago. Apple breaks iMessage, FaceTime, safari and just about anything that has to do with sending pictures and all they do is remain silent. What kind of customer service is this? I loved my ipad until I updated to IOS 6. IOS has turned it into a piece of junk that just continues to frustrate me and obviously a lot of other people that just keep trying to get the apple applications to work when the problems are all on the apple server end. I will never spend another penny on an apple product after being treated like this. If this keeps up it won't take too long before the most valuable company in the world sees a crash in their stock price, and rightfully so. We need to talk to apple by selling our stock because once this gets out their stock will be worth about as much as my useless ipad.

Nov 16, 2015 11:39 AM in response to rednival

So I have had this same problem since updating to iOS9.1. I ended up on a phone call with Apple and he had me connect to my computer, open iTunes, backup my computer to iTunes then do a full restore. This has worked to solve the issue for me.


He asked if I had updated to iOS 9.1 through iTunes or over wi-fi. I seemed to remember that it was over wi-fi and he mentioned that that may have had something to do with it, but then I forgot to get back to any details on that later in the call.


Anyway, I'm now happily moving forward with iMessage working for me.


I hope this solves your issue as well.


-S

Apr 6, 2016 11:05 AM in response to rednival

Tried all the suggested fixes above and still not working. I'm traveling international in Japan right now and it was working fine for the first couple days now I can't log into the iMessage server. I updated to 9.3.1 and that still didnt help. I've set my region to Japan, restarted, and it still can't contact the server. I have reset the auto time sync and that hasnt helped either.

Apr 13, 2016 11:23 AM in response to airforce653

User uploaded file

I have tried countless days to get my iMessage and FaceTime to connect. I have tried everything mentioned here multiple times and then finally I tried switching on the automatic date and time setting in General Settings. IT WORKED!! I am wondering if the problem could be from the time changing for daylight savings. (Since it wasn't on automatic...)

How do I fix "Unable to contact iMessage server. Try again." message?

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