iOS 26 iMessage Group Chat Duplication Issues

Question

iOS 26 iMessage Group Chat Duplication Issues

Once I updated to iOS 26, my iMessage has not been working properly.

A group chat I’ve had for YEARS with so many memories and photos is now not working and potentially getting deleted. Immediately after the update, the group chat split into two different chats. We can send one message in one chat, on my iPad, it goes to a second chat. One person in the group sees it in the original chat on their end, another person in the group sees the same message in a completely different chat. I now can't respond to the chat on my MacBook or iPad but I can on my iPhone. It's just all types of confusion.

And my friends are also having iMessage authentication issues. Is there any fix to this? Or will an update be pushed very soon to fix this?

iPhone 15 Pro Max, iOS 26

Posted on Sep 19, 2025 12:59 PM

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Answer 1

Sep 23, 2025 6:43 AM in response to JahSon_Snipes

Just voicing my agreement with OP here, this JUST started happening to me and apple support has basically said "did you try turning it off and on again" which does nothing. It's literally only one group chat that has done this so far, and its not doing it for any one else in the group chat. Everyone is on imessage too. I don't want to have to delete everything and start over because that is an inconvenience for everyone else in the chat.

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Answer 2

becjhen

Level 1

8 points

Sep 25, 2025 3:56 AM in response to kilotango017

I’m also having this issue!

In this instance, my friend got the new iPhone 17 and messaged in our group chat, someone responded and it popped up a new chat so now it is duplicated and all other users see the new chat as the original one and I see the new chat as the old one?

it’s so confusing. I updated to iOS26 yesterday, based in the UK and have an iPhone 16 Pro.

i also tried the on/off and that didn’t work.

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