New iPhone XS Max “Number changed to Primary” notification in iMessage

Using Dual SIM with an eSIM - Apple Support

You have to set up the primary and secondary numbers on the XsM

This is what worked for me.

Issue started after I changed my plan with ATT and rebooted a few times. Didn't want to lose the contacts or the years of SMS I've been collecting as an information hoarder. Spent two days on the interwebbernets looking for the definitive answer and trying different things. This worked - for me - and has stuck for a few hours:

1) Settings -> Messages

1) Send and Receive -

Turn off all addresses except phone number.

Turn off iMessage

2) Settings -> Phone

1) My Number

• • • Delete the phone number that is in this field.

3) Reboot phone

1) I didn't do hard reset, hard powerdown, none of that. Just vol down and side button until "power off" option, then once it was off for about a minute turned it back on.

4) Settings -> Messages

1) Turn iMessage back on.

2) wait a few seconds. Can back out of menu and come back in. Want to make sure it's no longer "waiting for approval"

3) Adjust "Send and Receive" to what you want it to be

• • • I receive at a few places, only send from phone number.
    • You will notice that there IS a phone number again.

5) Reboot iPhone - see step 3. Nothing funky here.

Viola - I tested with my droid buddies and no longer see the message.

This was all done on iOS 12.2 on a XS Max 512.

~D

Awesome! Thank you. Does your Max show you having a second sim IMEI if you look under Settings>General>About and scroll down to the bottom? It shows my primary AT&T network info and then right under shows a second SIM IMEI.

I seemed to have fixed mine a shorter way. I just removed my phone number from iMessages and then reactivate iMessages on my phone. It gave me that “Number changed to Primary” label one time and then hasn’t done it since and I’ve exchanged 12 texts with another person so far. Whereas before I was getting it every 1 to 2 messages. So, seems like resetting iMessages is a solution also. Yay!

I have the same problem! I’ve tried resetting iMessages and it didn’t fix it. Is it something they can update in the next iOS update? It doesn’t seem to affect any of the messages it’s just annoying

Oh no! I’m not sure to be honest because mine has been seemingly fine since re-enabling iMessage last night. I’m not sure what the issue is to be honest, I didn’t have the problem until I had AT&T set up my new Apple Watch 4 in cellular so I wasn’t sure at first if the issue was with that or not because didn’t use the phone until I got that’s set up because I pre-ordered them together.

Alright. I have this issue too, and have been working with senior engineers at support for 2 days! I restored and that didn't do anything. And followed some other suggestions on here. They said it's a known issue, I think they are just realizing how big it is. Andrew, the guy helping me said they are working way overtime on this. Will report back with updates.

Their method does not work! I am on the phone with Apple right now and have been working on it for a week with them. It's not an easy fix, and they will probably end up sending me a new phone because I'm starting to get mad.

None of these tactics worked for me either. What DID work was to delete the text altogether. When a new texting session started, it was gone.

So something buried within the hidden headers of the message are linking that chat to ... something ... and it keeps getting reset when the other person texts. Or something... I'm not that good a programmer lol.

But I noticed that logging off and back on worked for some, but not all, chats. The two where the message kept coming up constantly cleared up when I deleted them and started new.

Of course, you lose all the history of the text within the app itself, which does suck, and may be a non-starter for you.

This worked for me. I also noticed that prior my phone number under Settings>Phone was being reported as 1 (###) ###-#### and after deregistering iMessage and activating again it shows as +1 (###) ###-#### as it had on previous iPhones — maybe a coincidence or related. Someone can try and just change the phone number without iMessage deactivation/activation and see if that fixes it.

Someone here posted that deleting that text message fixes it. While I didn’t want to lose my text history, I finally tried deleting the text and it went away. Must’ve been something in the header file for that text. No other solution on here worked except deleting the text. Good luck!

I just figured it out for my situation (after deleting my a "turned-green" group message thread and trying to start over, which didn't work, unfortunately).

All I had to do was go into Messages on my Mac and send a message from there in the same group, and it resumed allowing my to send iMessage messages (blue bubbles) on my iPhone in the same conversation.

Hope this helps!

I had the same problem, if your not using the secondary line , go to settings, cellular then tap the secondary line a pop message will appear and say line not in use would you like to revamp contacts hit ok and this resolved the issue for me.

Okay after some tinkering, I was able to fix this message on my phone without having to do full backup and restore like the OP. Note that I use a traditional microSIM and do not have an e-SIM. Also, like the OP, I do not see "add cellular plan" or other menu items in my phone...

First: Settings>Messages>Send & Receive... I enabled ONLY my mobile number to send and receive iMessages (the default setting was to allow my iCloud account to do the same).

Second: Turn off iMessage for a minute or so and then reactivate.

Third: Turned my phone off for about a minute and then turned it back on.

This resolved the issue in a matter of minutes and did not require wiping the phone. HALLELUJAH!