Multiple Devices, One Apple ID, iMessage Chaos

Maybe I wasn't clear...

I want to be able to pick up my phone or ipad and see the same messages.

In other words, if somebody sends me a text, I want it to go to both devices (my iPad and my iPhone). And I want my reply to look the same regardless of which device I replied from.

Creating multiple Apple IDs is one way to have different devices recognize different iMessage & FaceTimes, but it sounds like the preferred method might be to use a single Apple ID for all the devices, but associate different e-mail addresses with each device. If you use your personal e-mail addresses for each device, only you would get the notification for that respective e-mail. If you wanted to send out a message to everyone, you would send a single message to that AppleID e-mail. Same holds true for FaceTime.

I have the same Apple ID Associated with both my iPad & my iPhone. I created a unique e-mail for both my iPad as well as my iPhone. When messages/FaceTime requests are sent to my Apple ID, I receive notifications on both on my iPad & iPhone. When notifications (for either FaceTime or iMessage) go to iPad@myemail.com only my iPad is notified. Same is true for iPhone@myemail.com. I can also FaceTime between the iPad & iPhone with the unique e-mail. The common Apple ID e-mail fails to connect since they both share that association and it is not unique.

Note: the example of iPad@myemail.com can be any e-mail that you own. If you "Add Another Email . . ." in the settings of either Message or FaceTime, you are just associating that e-mail with the active Apple ID. What ever devices are associated with that e-mail will get notifications directed to that e-mail.

If you only answer work iMessages & or FaceTimes on your iPhone then only associate your work e-mail with your iPhone. You could associate your home e-mail to both your iPhone & your iPad & then you would get notifications on both for all home FaceTimes or iMessages. The e-mail association "Add Another Email . . ." option exists for both Messages & FaceTime. Each are separate settings and if you want them both to notify in the same manner, you set them up the same way.

You, however, can only associate one e-mail address for only one Apple ID, so if you & your wife want to receive the same e-mail iMessage messages from some people, you both need to have the same Apple ID for your iMessages and then associate that common e-mail that you want to share. People reply to that e-mail & you could both receive the same message.

Jesse Hollington @ iLounge wrote a great article on this topic that can be found here:

http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/the-complete-guide-to-facetim e-imessage-set-up-use-and-troubleshooting/

Trasmc

you can do what you are trying to do.

i Have just setup an iPhone 3GS, a 4th Generation iPod (wifi only) and my new iPad (wifi only) all using the same Apple account.

For each device goto Settings/Messages/Send & Receive and make sure there is a unique entry where an iMessage can reach you.

For your phones it should be the cell number and for non telephone devices setup an email account to use.

my settings are:

ipod - my sons email address setup on device

iphone - using my cell number

ipad - using my email address setup on device

ive only just figured it out and need to test a little more but it's certainly stopped messages echoing across all devices, the message goes to where I intend it to go only

The idea is the folloinwg, I read an articla about it.

You can set up different authentication per different applications.

So my family has one AppleID/iTunesID, that is the one to be used to purchase stuff.

Each member of the family has an icloudID.

Family: family@myemail.com

Dad dad@icloud.com ( one iPhone, one iPad)

Mon: mom@icloud.com ( oone iPhone)

Son: son@icloud.com (one iPad)

SO for eMessages, email, iCloud Backup, everyone uses their own icloud ID, so everyone has their 5GB of backup Storage, for example.

Then I have an iPhone and an iPad undee my icloudID< so I share the Storage, iMessages, etc.

but mom, and son they have their own iMessages, icloud ID, etc...

Then also you can select which of your emails and telephone numbers you use to send/receive iMessages

Just have a look to this post:

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/mo-ipads-mo-problems-solving-the-apple-id-conund rum-175771

Here is the issue that I am having, and it just popped up when my wife got her iPhone5. We also share the same AppleID. On both phones we have the options of receiving iMessages at both of our email addresses and our two phone numbers. We've turned of the options on both phones with the exception of our telephone numbers. The problem is, her phone reverts to all of the email address and phone numbers each time she turns off the phone, and occasionally when she charges. So even if you make the change on her phone it randomly decides to boycott the changes we've made and does whatever it wants. It is incredibly frustrating as she et m convos with others and when we message each other, she gets duplicates of messages as she is sending and receiving messages on my phone number. What a pain in the ***.

I totally understand the concepts here, but my kids new devices are being finicky. I have 4 kids and 2 parents on the same Apple ID.

I have set up each kid to have an Apple ID for iCloud backup purposes. Under Messages when I try to add Kid 1's email to where they can be reached by iMessage at, I keep getting unable to verify email because it is already in use.

Any ideas?

try logging out of everything on the device. Itunes/app store, imessage, factime, icloud, gameceter, and check what email accts you have loaded on the device. Then login to everthing again with the Apple Id you want to use for each service/app. I recommed login into the itunes/app store last, there are less problems that way.

each servcie has a seperate Apple Id login - Itunes/app store, Facetime, iMeassge, iCloud, Gameceter and email can me any email acct you want on the device. Therefore you can have differnet apple Id acciociated with different apps (Itunes/app store, Facetime, iMeassge, iCloud, Gameceter ) because eache has a seperate login. I use one iCloud accct so I can share Calenders and Find my iPhone app to located all of my 8 Apple devices with one find my iphone app You can have multiple icloud accts on one device and select which differnt actions you want that acct to do. examples - contacts, calenders, remingers, back up, notes, passbook, photostream, find my iphone.

Similar problem. Both my wife and I had the same Id until today .i set up a new I'd for mt new is5 but my iPad shares the old or I'd my wife is using. How to remedy the problem

I was probably too long winded in my previous post. If you do not want to set up another Apple ID, you just associate different e-mails with different devices.

You choose the option to "Add Another Email . . ." in the settings of either Message or FaceTime of a specific iOS device, you are just associating that e-mail with the active Apple ID for that device. What ever devices are associated with that e-mail will get notifications directed to that device.

If you use the same Apple ID for all your devices you can get all notifications with that Apple ID on all the devices. The new "Added" e-mail can be unique to each device and will get notifications to the device. Similarly, if you add that e-mail to 2 of the 3 devices, notifications with that unique e-mail will be sent to those two devices and not the 3rd.

The main Apple ID e-mail will get all notifications.

Hope this makes sense.

There is a whole article on the topic @:

http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/the-complete-guide-to-facetim e-imessage-set-up-use-and-troubleshooting/

I had the same problem too when I first tried to "add" an e-mail. I to got "unable to verify email because it is already in use."

The problem here is you are trying to add another e-mail that is associated to another Apple ID. When you associate other e-mails with your main Apple ID, it can not already be an e-mail that has an Apple ID. It only lets you create "Alias e-mails" that actually point to or reference your Apple ID that you use for messaging or facetime.

This is what needs to be done:

You need to continue to use the "messaging Apple ID" for all accounts.

You can not use the "iCloud BackUp Apple IDs" since they belong to "other people"

You must create 6 new e-mails that you can then associate with the two parents and 4 kids unique iOS devices.

Results will be:

The "messaging Apple ID" e-mail will send notifications to all devices

The unique "alias e-mails" become associated with that Apple ID but only connect to the devices that have been associated to the Apple ID through the system preferences on the iOS device.

For example:

"New Parent1 e-mail" will be associated with the "messaging Apple ID" but sent to the device(s) where you associated that e-mail to that Apple ID.

Same with others so:

"New Kid1 e-mail" will be associated with the "messaging Apple ID" but sent to the device(s) where you associated that e-mail to that Apple ID.

If everyone uses an iPad, you could associate all 6 new e-mails and everyone's messages & facetime would come through that iPad. You, however, may not be able to facetime back and forth amongst the devices and the shared iPad unless you create a 7th unique iPad e-mail that you can use for Facetime.

As long as you don't try to Facetime someone else with the facetime e-mail you are using, you can actually facetime with the different devices. If an e-mail is used on both devices, FaceTime does not allow it because it would get confused as to where to send that data too.

You may still get the error message if one of the devices is using a different Apple ID for messaging or Facetime since the "e-mail alias" can not be associated with more than one Apple ID. I believe you can go to Apple's website and delete that e-mail from being associated with the Apple ID. Just remember to use the Apple ID to log into your account & not the associated Apple ID Alias.

Hope this helps.

I think you can associate your phone number from your phone to another device as long as it uses the same AppleID for the messaging portion. That way, if someone sends you a message to your phone, you would receive it on your iPad as well.

The only Caveat-- if the message coming in really is an SMS from your cell phone provider, it will not come to your iPad, since the iPad only supports iMessages sent through Apple Servers.

From what I learned, you can't associate a phone number with anything except that phone.

But if a phone has an appleID, then you can associate your other device (say iPad) with that AppleID by using the primary or any associated email address registered with that AppleID.

• You can have multiple email addresses for a single AppleID.

  One is a primary, and the others are just associated addresses.

• An email address can only be associated with one AppleID.
  • So you can't just simply let people join your group.
  • If each family member registers an AppleID with their Messages, then you will not be able to have an address where you all receive the same message.
• If all family members share the same AppleID for Messaging, then you can configure each device with only receive Messages for one (or more) of the associated email addresses. But there's a big BUT...

  In this case, you CANNOT prevent the owner of one of the devices from adding the other addresses. Hence, you don't have any guarantee of privacy. It would be very easy for your child to enable your email address (just check the box) and view all of your text messages. (I haven't looked into parental controls as a solution, but I would imagine that your spouse wouldn't be too keed on being locked out of his/her device).

So my suggestion for family/shared accounts, is to have one shared AppleID for iTunes/Apps. And use a completely separate and unique AppleID's for Messaging/Contacts/iCloud for each member of the group/family.

I answered all this in a previous post.

See the following link and let me know if you have any issue.

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/mo-ipads-mo-problems-solving-the-apple-id-conund rum-175771

A little more detailed is this post:

http://gigaom.com/2012/05/26/how-many-apple-ids-should-your-family-have/

I hope this helps