How to add additional email addresses to iMessage
iMessage is great way to send and receive text and multimedia images with any iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad running iOS 5 or higher, as well as any Mac running OS X Mountain Lion. Along with receiving iMessages at your phone number on the iPhone, you can receive iMessages at your Apple ID email address on iOS and OS X as well. But what if you've got more than one email address and you want to be able to use all of them with iMessages?
For example, maybe you don't want to give your phone number or personal, primary Apple ID away to just everyone, but instead want to have an extra address, or addresses, to give out to those who aren't close friends or family? Or if you want one just for a temporary job you're doing? Luckily, you can do just that.
Before you can start using an email address for iMessage, however, you'll need to make sure it's not an existing Apple ID. If your email addresses are @icloud.com, @me.com, or @mac.com your email address is automatically an Apple ID. If you have an iTunes account, the email address associated with that, and with FaceTime, are also automatically Apple IDs.
You can only have one Apple ID linked to iMessage account at a time. However, if you have additional, non-Apple ID email addresses you'd like to use with iMessage, such as Gmail, Yahoo, or Hotmail accounts that aren't connected as an Apple ID, you can set those up.
How to add additional email addresses to iMessage on iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad
- Launch the Settings app from the Home screen of your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch.
- Scroll down and tap into the Messages section.
- Tap on the Send & Receive section.
- Choose the option labeled Add Another E-mail... under the iMessage at: section.
- Type in the secondary email address you'd like to use with iMessage. Remember, it can't be an existing Apple ID.
- Wait until you receive an email from Apple verifying the address you are trying to add.
- Click the link in it in order to verify it.
Once verified you can start sending and receiving iMessages at any email address you've added.
How to add additional e-mails to iMessage in Mac OS X Mountain Lion
- Launch the Messages app on your Mac.
- From the main Mac menu along the top choose Messages and then click on Preferences.
- Under the Accounts tab, click on your iMessage account.
- To the right, you'll see a section labeled as You can be reached for messages at:. Click the "+" sign and type in the e-mail address you'd like to be able to send and receive iMessages at. You'll already see your main Apple ID listed.
- Apple will attempt to verify this e-mail by sending a message to that e-mail address. Once you receive it, click the link it contains in order to complete the verification process.
How-to, jailbreak, and DIY Editor at iMore, owner at The Pod Drop & AnoStyle, Potter pundit, and the ninja in your iOS
There are 15 comments. Add yours.
Really it is very helpful information for me, I appreciate it very much, This information make my smart phone more useful. thanks.
One additional point: If you have two iCloud accounts, you can't set one as primary and add the second email address as well.
Right. I said that in the very beginning of the article.
Ally,
I'm not sure what the benefit is of this. Yes, you can add more than one email address, but there is only one Caller Id (FROM address) that can be used at a time. So, if you have a personal address and a work address, you cannot easily switch back and forth between sending from personal vs sending from business, without having to go into the Messages settings menu and changing this each time. Am I missing something? Is there an easier way to switch or choose who it's "FROM" when sending at the point of creating the actual message? If I have to go four menu's deep (Settings -> Messages -> Receive At -> Caller ID) each time I want to switch, then it becomes more of a chore than benefit. Plus, then I have to remember what was the last one I sent from each time I want to send at a later time, so I don't accidentally send a message from my personal address to a business contact.
Can you expand a little more on what your thought was when you mentioned the personal vs work example? Maybe I'm just misunderstanding.
Thanks!
Kevin
There are times when I actually don't "want" to use iMessage with my iMore or other work e-mails. Perhaps I am on vacation and don't want those e-mails receiving iMessages. I can delete them and add them back later.
You can also choose the start new thread as the point of contact you don't mind people having. Your personal friends will have your other e-mails. Your colleagues or acquaintances will not have them.
Hi Ally,
Thanks for the response. You are correct that your friends will have one address, and work contacts will have another. But the issue isn't what address they have, but it's when I try to send messages TO THEM, it can only come from whatever ID is chosen as the Caller ID at that moment. So, if I start a message with a work contact using a fake@fakework.com work address, but then want to send a message to my friend using a fake@fakehome.com personal address, I need to switch the caller ID to fake@fakehome.com before sending to that friend, otherwise, they might not recognize the work address. Then, if I want to switch back to the work conversation, I have to switch the Caller ID back to the fake@fakework.com work address. Otherwise, if I don't, the message will come to the work contact, but show as a different address messaging them, as it will come from a different address (fake@fakehome.com). That's really my point. Using different email addresses to message work contacts vs personal contacts doesn't seem to be a viable option until Apple allows you to select the FROM address when composing a message, like you can do in in Apple Mail app.
Thanks.
Kevin
That isn't how it works. I just tested this. Whatever e-mail they send the message to is what it will respond from. The caller ID is for new messages. Not existing ones. I get that it's a pain when starting a new thread but for existing ones, it uses whatever ID they sent it to when responding.
Gotcha! I learned something new today! In theory, I could set up a conversation and leave it in the Message app (just delete messages, but not the entire conversation), and then I should be good. Thanks for the response, Ally!
Does anyone know if it is possible to use iMessage and Facetime on a iPhone with no cell service, WiFi only? This would be my kids phone. He not old enough for service, but is old enough to stay home by himself. No Jailbreak. In testing it just says “Activating”. Think Apple uses the phone number to create the accounts. I just want to login with his iTunes account and use the email address instead of a phone number, just like an iPad or iPod Touch.
Thanks, it really helped me.
Hey, so I'm a little late on this, but I hope to get answered. I was wondering, if I had already sent a friend an iMessage with my personal email, and then I send a co-worker an iMessage with my work email, will my friend see the work email? And will my co-worker see my personal email? And will any of them be able to see my Apple ID? Thanks in advance.
That's all very well and good, but how do you REMOVE email addresses from the OS X app? I have one appearing as an option that hasn't been active for years and I've yet to discover any way to remove it.
I have the same problem. I was trying to add an additional address in Messages on Mac OS X but I typed it wrong. Now Apple is sending this wrong address a confirmation email. How do I remove it? I tried accessing the list of addresses from my iDevice and it doesn't show the mistyped address.
To top it off, every time I try again to add the correct address (the one I tried to add originally), Messages crashes.
I found where the errant address was hiding. Look in Preferences in FaceTime. You'll find it there. Delete it and then put in the correct one.
Thanks Voenix. I tried that but it's not in there. However, looking closer at Messages I now see why it probably didn't send the address to FaceTime. My typo was that I didn't type the "@" symbol, so it's not a real email address.