A common problem for any Android user may be that they cannot send a text message to a single person. They can send and receive text messages from others, but for some reason, messages sent to this one person just aren’t getting through.
Here is a list of things to check to troubleshoot this issue.
Restart the Phone
A simple restart might do the trick. Hold down the “Power” button, then select “Restart“.
Check Blocking
Sometimes blocking happens accidentally. Check to be sure that you didn’t accidentally end up on a block list either with the message recipient’s carrier or on the block list of the recipient’s phone.
Check Contact Number
Open the “Contacts” app and ensure the phone number is correct. Also try the phone number with or without the “1” before the area code. I have seen it both work and not work in either configuration. Personally, I just fixed a problem texting where the “1” was missing.
Disable iMessage
If the recipient or sender has used or is currently using an iPhone, it can cause problems for Android users since the iPhone utilizes the iMessage network. Have the iPhone user disable iMessage by going to “Settings” > “Messages” and setting “iMessage” to “Off“.
In some cases, the iPhone user will need to perform these steps:
- Power off your smartphone.
- Power the iPhone off and insert the SIM card you used with the device before.
- Power on the iPhone.
- Ensure you are connected to a Wi-Fi network.
- Open “Settings” > “Messages“.
- Slide “iMessage” to “Off“.
- Leave the iPhone powered on for about an hour. iMessage should eventually deactivate.
- Power on your device.
If you cannot perform this process, or you are still experiencing this problem, try the following steps to deactivate iMessage online:
Note: These steps will remove access to the appstore. You can always reactivate the device to gain access again if you wish.
- Visit the Apple Support Profile website, and login with your Apple credentials.
- Select your iPhone device on the site.
- Select “Unregister“, then select “Unregister” again.
iMessage should now be deactivated. Check to see if you can receive text messages from an iPhone user.
If things still aren’t working for you, or you cannot perform the above steps, contact Apple Support. They can usually send a code to your new phone and deactivate iMessage on their end. It usually takes a period of 24 hours for the deactivation to complete.
This process has fixed this issue on multiple occasions. On one occasion, we contacted Apple Support via email. The Support department said that the person sending the text message may need to change how they are sending text messages. They will need to use an account with that shows “name”(Mobile Phone) instead of “name”(iPhone). These instructions didn’t make sense to us, but I figured I would include that information in case it helps anybody.
FAQ
I have an iPad registered to the same phone number I am using with my Android. What do I do?
You will have to deactivate iMessage on the iPad and any other Apple devices that are linked to the phone number you are using if you wish to receive text messages on the Android.
Lana says
i’ve been googling this to no avail, my landlord tried texting me from his iphone (tmobile) for the first time, i was not in his contacts, he entered my number with and without the leading 1, every time, he got this message => free msg: unable to send message – message blocking is active. so i tried texting him from my android (tracfone/safelink wireless) and got the same free msg! he never blocked me, i never blocked him, we are not on each others contacts. i can’t find the answer to this, help! thanks in advance :)
Leanne says
I had the same problem with texting my mom. I finally tried disabling the message app and then enabling it again and this fixed the problem.
Mark says
Had this issue also with my mom’s “contact”. I could not get her messenger window to come up. I fixed it by completely DELETING her from my contacts. Then, brought up the phone keypad, punched in her phone number, then, at the top where it says “ad new contact”, I added her as a new contact. All is working now. It is possible it somehow became corrupted. Hope this helps.
Someone says
On my android phone, the contact was set to “voice” instead of “mobile”. I changed it and it worked.
D Davison says
Richard Costello’s suggestion worked for me! All of a sudden couldn’t text my daughter. Found this thread a tried entering the phone number instead of clicking on her contact name. It worked!
Richard Costello says
Another possible solution from Google that worked on my pixel was to enter the person’s phone number not name in address field. I don’t know why but it fix the problem.
Kay says
Thank you PatriciaJ – your suggestion worked to have the other person restart 👍
Alicia Villamil says
My android phone Samsung Galaxy note 4 can’t send messages to 2332, 2336 etc.
PatriciaJ says
I tried deleting the thread, the cashe, restarting the phone multiple times, sending on and off WIFI and nothing worked. Finally asked the other person to restart their phone and that worked. Doesn’t make any sense. This is not something we should be dealing with in today’s society. Seriously,