How long for iMessage to become deactivated

[skiltrip]

I'm considering switching back and forth (keeping both) between an Android and my iPhone 6.
My only obvious concern with this is iMessage causing texts to not work when I'm on the Android handset.

My wife also has an iPhone. I've tried disabling iMessage on my iPhone (SIM is still in, it's still my only phone). But even after I do that, when she tries to text me, it's not getting to me. Does it take a while to de-register, and if so, how long should I reasonably wait for texts to start arriving as regular SMS?

 

[melman101]

No idea, but you can try this. Maybe it will help.

https://selfsolve.apple.com/deregister-imessage

 

[skiltrip]

No idea, but you can try this. Maybe it will help.

https://selfsolve.apple.com/deregister-imessage

Thank you. I've done the "Still have your iPhone?" section, and it didn't work. I'm just wondering if maybe it takes a certain number of hours to take affect.

Since I'm only experimenting right now, I'd hate to contact apple to deregister, only to go back and turn it on again the following day.

 

[iphonedude2008]

If you're in a group message, that will always stay an iMessage. I've switched back and forth too and no matter how many times I disable and deactivate, the group message doesn't convert to MMS

 

[Darryjr]

I'm considering switching back and forth (keeping both) between an Android and my iPhone 6.
My only obvious concern with this is iMessage causing texts to not work when I'm on the Android handset.

My wife also has an iPhone. I've tried disabling iMessage on my iPhone (SIM is still in, it's still my only phone). But even after I do that, when she tries to text me, it's not getting to me. Does it take a while to de-register, and if so, how long should I reasonably wait for texts to start arriving as regular SMS?

Try to start a fresh new message thread , delete old ones , than see if that works. I switch back and forth regularly and sometimes if the person starts a new message thread with me it seems to work.

 

[ViperDesign]

I had to change my password on apple to get those messages now.

 

[skiltrip]

I did some playing around and it worked like this.

I first turned off iMessage and Facetime as per the "self solve" instructions. No dice. My wife's iPhone still treated my number as iMessage. I did step two in the "self solve" and had them text me a code to enter I'm on the website to deactivate.

Then tried to text myself from my wife's iPhone. It failed, BUT when I clicked the little "i" info icon it asked if I wanted to send as a text message. I said yes, and it treated my number like normal SMS from that point on. The next day I turned iMessage back on in settings and my wife's iPhone and I were right back communicating via iMessage.

It seems you can use that "text me a code" option as often as you want to deregister from iMessage when you need to.

 

[lordofthereef]

Apologies if I missed something, but IMO the best solution would be to just turn iMessages off completely if you're going to be jumping back and forth frequently. If, for whatever reason, this is not an option, you can always manually turn iMessages off while you're still on the iPhone and do your sim swap over to android after the fact. That has always been instant for me.

 

[Flow39]

I switch between my iPhone 6 and 2014 Moto X (hopefully soon to be a Nexus 6p) here and there whenever I feel like it. I have switched on a moment's notice a number of times. All I do when switching to the Moto X is:

1) Turn off iMessage AND FaceTime
2) Send test text to a friend /family member, see if it goes through as SMS
3) Have them send a text to me as SMS
4) If it works both ways, power off and pull SIM out
5) Put SIM in Android phone

Never had a problem doing this, and the only texts that don't come through are group messages. I just tell them to delete the group message and start a new one, and then it's good to go. The earlier you turn off iMessage, the better. That is preferable to just quickly doing those steps I listed above and switching, but I haven't had any issues doing so and I've switched like this 8+ different times and have seen no problems.

 

[OTACORB]

Apologies if I missed something, but IMO the best solution would be to just turn iMessages off completely if you're going to be jumping back and forth frequently. If, for whatever reason, this is not an option, you can always manually turn iMessages off while you're still on the iPhone and do your sim swap over to android after the fact. That has always been instant for me.

I agree, why even bother to turn iMessage on and off like that. Just leave it off and it's not like those with an iPhone can't text you. Once you leave it off, you won't miss a beat.

 

[ultravisitor]

I'm considering switching back and forth (keeping both) between an Android and my iPhone 6.

If you're going to do this, then don't use iMessage. Download and install Hangouts on your devices and use that instead. It's cross platform.

 

[Dodgeman]

Recently thinking of doing a switch and I’ve turned off iMessage and FaceTime.
What’s the turn around time for my messages and group messages to work?