"iMessage needs to be enabled to send this message?

This routine did not work for me - still can't send non- iMessage texts. I've tried everything on this thread and the only way to force SMS is to shut-off cell data altogether, which is not what I want to do.

It would impossible for me to more frustrated with Apple at this point. It worked fine. Then iOS8 happened. Now I can't send texts. Brilliant innovation if you don't mind delays of minutes and hours between when messages are sent and when they're received. I especially like the feature which labels messages as delivered even though they've not been. Hard to understand why they've destroyed basic cell functionality.

This routine did not work for me - still can't send non- iMessage texts.

Lol, I don't think anyone mentioned that the person you are sending iMessage to ALSO has to have iMessage turned on. Or else you won't even be able to send an iMessage. You can tell whether the messages you send are blue (enabled) or green (disabled).

I tried several suggestion to get this to stop happening and the network reset finally did it! I have a huge wifi password so I waited till I was out of other options but the one contact that just would not get over the imessage glitch is now working! Thanks! I did not fine the post you referenced on doing that to fix texting errors, so I could have been banging my head for a long time yet.

Dug up the link... The network reset solution came from here: http://www.imobie.com/support/common-ios-8-upgrade-problems-and-solutions.htm#qu estion8

I don't know that this addressed the exact problem I was having, but the solution worked.

Did you also revive your wifi PW when you reset and then try to send SMS? The network reset worked for me until I revived the wifi connection, then it was back to business-as-usual with no SMS texting.

I think this is the opposite of the problem - iOS8 will not send SMS when both iPhones have iMessage disabled.

Yes, in fact I re-entered the password before I tried sending the text. When I opened messages it was normal looking with no imessage in the box.

Maybe you have a different iPhone? Mine is a 5s.

Sure it will. as long as your phone plan has texting. I tried all the other things here to like turning off FaceTime. (which I left off) so It may be a combination of settings. Keep trying!

Re: "iOS8 will not send SMS when both iPhones have iMessage disabled."

Maybe we're talking about different things here, but I think this statement is incorrect. I am running iOS8 on an 4S. Under my Messages settings, iMessage is disabled; MMS Messaging and Group Messaging are enabled; and I am able to send and receive group and text messages through my phone plan, and I am sending/receiving to users with iMessage disabled, with iMessage enabled and with non-Apple phones. I had trouble for a short while after upgrading to iOS8, but that was resolved (in my case) with a combination of network reset and enabling then disabling iMessage.

We're not talking about different things - sounds like you got it fixed on your phone, but I've tried all those fixes and still can't send SMS between two iMessage disabled iPhones.

I found a fix that worked on my iphone 5. If you delete the text that is stuck on sending with imessage and then initiate another text to the same person it then defaults back to sms. It makes me think that the phone remembers the way the message was sent last to a specific person and defaults to it. Anyway see it if works for you.

Yes, I had revived my wifi password almost immediately after resetting the network. No issues with SMS after that.

I tried everything in this forum and nothing worked.

So I called my provider Verizon and we called Apple care.

My problem was that I don't use iMessage (never had it turned on before or after the IOS 8.1 update), and I was able to send text messages (green) to several people, but wasn't able to send texts to one person-my brother. Kept giving me the message from the original post. I turned iMessage on and sent it to him as an iMessage (in blue). Then turned iMessage off and it kept giving me the error message.

It was strange that for some people I could send texts and then for my brother I couldn't.

I was advised to delete the whole conversation and start a new one. Once I did this, I was able to send him the message as text. Super simple fix.

Apple care guy said if you have any previous iMessages in a conversation, this can prohibit sending texts to that particular person if you've upgraded to the new iOS system. Because my brother had sent me iMessages in our previous conversation, this has caused a glitch.

Thanks! I deleted the conversation, disabled iMessage, and can now send plain texts. Thanks for taking the time to post the fix.