How do I sync my Messages between my Mac, iPhone, and my iPad?

This can be a bit tricky to set up, but it is possible.

in Messages (OS X):

1. Launch Messages and open Prefs > Accounts.

2. Make sure you are logged in with the AppleID you are using all your devices.

3. Set caller ID to this email address/AppleID.

iPad:

1. Go to Settings > Messages.

2. Make sure iMessage is set to ON.

3. Tap "receive at" and make sure you are logged in with the same AppleID you are using on your Mac.

4. Tap "caller ID" and make sure that email address/AppleID is selected.

iPhone:

1. Go to Settings > Messages.

2. Make sure iMessage and Send as SMS are both set to ON.

3. Tap "recieve at" and make sure you are logged into the same AppleID as on your Mac and iPad.

4. Tap "caller ID" and make sure that email address/AppleID is selected.

Going forward, when anyone on an IOS device sends you a Message they need to send it to your AppleID/email address, NOT your phone number. In this way all messages will be in sync across all devices.

in Messages (OS X):

1. Launch Messages and open Prefs > Accounts.

2. Make sure you are logged in with the AppleID you are using all your devices.

3. Set caller ID to this email address/AppleID.

I, too, have been trying to receive iMessages on both my iphone and imac. My question is where to find the "set caller ID to this email address/AppleID" in Messages. I do not see this in the Prefs > Accounts.

Can you help me find this, please?

Lynn

HI,

This pic is from the Version 7 version of Messages and not the Version 7.0.1 version that is installed with the OS X 10.8.2 update.

This version will not sync properly as you needs to be at version 7.0.1 and iOS 6.

9:16 PM Monday; January 28, 2013

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Mountain Lion 10.8.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
 Couple of iPhones and an iPad
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

Right, I think this is the confusion I was having. If someone sends me an iMessage from their iPhone to mine, they may use my cell nummer. This is still an iMessage, but it will ONLY come to my phone and that conversation will never sync to my Messages app on 10.8. However if they send an iMessage from their phone to my email address (the email address that is being used for the Apple ID login, the "Recieve At" address and the "Caller ID"), the message will go to both my phone and my Messages app on 10.8.

The Caller ID setting used, I am assuming, doesnt direct messages anywhere, but it does tell the receiver where how the message was sent--therefore encouraging future messages to come through the method preferred (in my case, the email address and not the cell phone numer so I can receive at my computer as well).

The above is me just regurgitating what I THINK I learned from a couple of threads now. If Im wrong, someone please set me straight because this whole Messages syncing has given me a lot of headaches! 🙂

Since some future update to iPad might possibly potentially maybe perhaps allow you to receive iMessages sent to your iPhone's phone number, I would imagine OS X would follow.... IF this were to happen, of course.

I don't know anything about future updates, though, so this is simply pure conjecture 🙂

This did not work for me.

I have only one apple ID and when I go to my computer "MESSAGES" app..none of the conversations sync. There are none of my chats that download to the MESSAGES app. I've checked everything.

I tried disabling the account and renabling

I tried deleting Messages Prefs.

Nothing.

If you highlight the email account in the left panel that you want iMessages sent to, you should see the email address listed in the "You can be reached for messages at:" section on the right side. If it's not there, I believe you should be able to click on the "+" and add it.

Looking at the screen shot you posted you have one email address configured in Messages, which is why you don't see the "caller ID" pull down menu. There is no requirement for you to have any addresses other than the one associated with your iCloud account.

I have tried everything mentioned in this thread so far and I am still unable to get my iMessages to send to the Messages app. I have my Apple ID set up on Messages and I also have my caller ID set as my Apple ID on my iPhone. If it matters, my "Receive At" on my iPhone is set as 2 addresses... one being my Apple ID, the other my phone number. I only have one email address (my Apple ID) set on Messages, so there shouldn't be any conflict there.

Anyway, like I said, I've followed everything already mentioned in this thread and I still can't get iMessages to send to the Messages app on my Mac. In fact, I already had everything configured properly before I even read this thread so I didn't need to change anything.

For what it's worth, I used the Messages beta on Lion (10.7) and it worked perfectly fine. In fact, it impressed me so much that it's one of the reasons I upgraded to Mountain Lion (10.8). Ever since performing the upgrade though, I have been unable to make it work. I am still able to send and receive messages via chat services like AIM, but iMessages will not "talk" to my Messages app. Can anyone shed some light on why my service doesn't work anymore but used to?

Tatanko wrote:

I have tried everything mentioned in this thread so far and I am still unable to get my iMessages to send to the Messages app.

I'm afraid I don't know what this means. Can you be more specific? To send a Message between devices (iPhone to Mac) you send the Message to the registered AppleID. Is that what you are doing?

I guess I'm not sure if I am now that you mention it. What I want to happen is for friends of mine with iPhones to be able to send me an iMessage and have it appear on my Mac. That's exactly how it worked for me when I was using the beta on 10.7. Those friends only have my cell phone number, they do not have my Apple ID (email address) on their phones. Likewise, I do not have their Apple IDs (email addresses) on my Mac. But again, during the beta, I didn't need to; all that needed to happen was for them to send me a "text" to my cell phone number like you would do on any cell phone, but in this case because we both have iPhones we are using iMessage automatically and it forwarded that cell-phone-number-only iMessage to my Mac. This no longer happens on 10.8, and I have not changed how I do anything since moving from the beta to 10.8 (in addition to all of my settings being as you say they should be in this thread).

I guess what I'm asking is, why does something that used to work automatically during the beta no longer work at all for me during the final version?

I think you may be misunderstanding how it worked. You say:

Tatanko wrote:

But again, during the beta, I didn't need to; all that needed to happen was for them to send me a "text" to my cell phone number like you would do on any cell phone, but in this case because we both have iPhones we are using iMessage automatically and it forwarded that cell-phone-number-only iMessage to my Mac.

I'm sorry, but this did not happen. Nothing was ever "forwarded" from your iPhone's phone number to Messages on your Mac. The service simply doesn't work that way.

To have your messages show up on all your devices the message must be sent to your registered iCloud account AppleID. There's no other way to do it that I am aware of.

Not to be rude, but I know what I saw and how I used the service. I used it exactly as I described in my previous post. I have nothing to gain from lying and I am not technically incompetent.

Just in case this may be part of the confusion, I am not implying that anybody sending me a text had their message forwarded to my Mac -- ONLY others using iMessage (on their iPhones) were able to be forwarded.

I used the service this way all the time at work because it was incredibly convenient. I will say that about 90% of the time the messages came to both my iPhone and my Mac simultaneously (or with one or the other slightly delayed). Unless my friends are adding my Apple ID email address to my contact info on their phones unbeknownst to me, then they are only sending messages to my phone number. This is highly unlikely because most of the people I know with iPhones would never understand that distinction and simply wouldn't go out of their way to do that when they could just send messages to my cell number like they would anybody else. In fact, I'd wager to say most of them don't even know what iMessage is or how it works.

If in fact what you're saying is correct -- that my friends need to add my Apple ID and send their messages there -- then why did I not have to do this during the beta? Again, there is no way my friends are sending messages to my Apple ID... most of them don't understand the difference between a text and an iMessage.

Tatanko wrote:

Not to be rude, but I know what I saw and how I used the service. I used it exactly as I described in my previous post. I have nothing to gain from lying and I am not technically incompetent.

I wasn't trying to imply you were lying or technically incompetent, Just that you may have misunderstood what was happening behind the scenes.

At any rate, in my experience, I have never seen Messages work in the way you describe so I can't really offer any more advice. As to the upcoming iOS and OS X updates I will be very interested to see how Apple handles whatever they are going to do with phone numbers and AppleIDs. Hopefully it will make the entire process easier to use.

I can confirm that Tatanko's post is truthful. In fact, this is how it works on my Mac and iPhone and I'm trying to set it up similarly for my girlfriend's computer. She has two AppleIDs though and I think this may be why it is not associating the correct one with her phone number. I can tell you though that my Messages application automatically updates on my computer when text messages are sent from other iPhone users. I only have one AppleID. How my girlfriend's is set up is with two Apple IDs, so the default setting seems to make the first Apple ID be the one sending the iMessages instead of from her iPhone...so while I can still receive them, I have to set up two different chat threads on my iPhone and she doesn't get the benefits of the auto updating feature of showing all her texts messages.

How do I get it to work just like mine? A few more details: we are both using MacBook Pros with OS 10.8.2., both of us have new iPhone 5s with iOS 6 installed, her computer is set up in Japanese (seems to function identically - I am in Japan too), and the only difference seems to be the two Apple IDs that she has. She has one associated with a US account because it wouldn't convert in iTunes to make Japanese iTunes purchases, necessitating making a new Apple ID and getting into this mess.

Any posts on how to solve this would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!