Your iPhone could not be activated because the activation server cannot be reached

Question

So yesterday I went to sleep and I saw an update. I didn't update since I couldn't be bothered, but when I woke up and turned on my iPhone it said update completed. But when I tried to activate it I get that message. I have an iPhone 7 plus and I've been using it for around 3.3 years. P.S the update I downloaded was IOS 13.3.1

Answer 1

Since you have an iPhone 7/Plus i immidiately suspect one of the many chip problems plauging those two models (actually the problem is with the motherboard substrate itself, I think).

If it is this one problem, you can find out by jumping to the initial "Hello" screen after the update, if you have that, and selecting the info i in a small circle in the bottom right corner. It will show you various hardware parameters of your phone, such as the serial number. It should also show the IMEI and a few others it gets from the mobile network chip (as far as I understand).

If it is unable to retrieve one or more of these parameters from the hardware, which is a common affliction of the iPhone 7 series, you will not see them in that info screen and it will not be able to activate, and you might get the error you are reporting, despite it managing to reach the activation server. The problem is rather that it doesn't manage to give the activation server the info it is requesting.

If you find that this is indeed the case, nobody is able to fix your phone but Apple, but you might be able to get a free service if you can convince them that it is the same problem essentially (which it is), as the one they have a free program for: https://support.apple.com/iphone-7-no-service

Answer 2

Solutions:

1. Wait For Sometime

2. Restart

3. Check your Wi-Fi / Network

4. If you're using a cellular data connection, connect to a reliable Wi-Fi network instead.

OR

Fix iPhone Activation Errors using iTunes

If you still can't activate, here's how to activate your iPhone through iTunes instead:

• Make sure that you have the latest version of iTunes.

• Check that your computer has an Internet connection.

• Connect your iPhone to your computer via the USB cable. Turn it off and reboot.

• Open iTunes on your computer.

• Wait while iTunes detects and activates your iPhone:

• If iTunes shows, "Set up as New" or "Restore from Backup," it means that iTunes activated your iPhone.

• If an error in iTunes says that the SIM card isn't compatible, contact your carrier.

Answer 3

I just encountered this issue after I did a full reset (Settings -> General -> Reset -> Erase All Content and Settings) on an iPhone 6s.

After restarting, I couldn't get past the Activation screen, the phone was always claiming that the Activation Server could not be reached.

I tried different Wifi Networks, used just the Mobile Data connection, checked the status of Apple's Activation servers - nothing helped.

Then I read somewhere that your iPhone should have the latest iOS version - I installed the Apple Configurator app on my Mac (available from the Apple Mac Store for free), connected the iPhone to the Mac, and updated to the latest iOS version:

After the iOS update completed I tried the activation again - still no luck.

I then tried to connect the iPhone to iTunes (now called "Music") - iTunes detected the device and asked me to "Click to open Finder" - it then started the activation process...and gave me this error:

The iPhone “iPhone” cannot be synced. Received an unexpected response from the device.

So now I am stuck with a perfectly good phone that I reset to start afresh - which has essentially turned into a brick. Genius Bar time :-(

And sorry, this is not really an answer to the question, just an attempt in adding some things that did NOT work for me...

Answer 4

This is actually very simple...On the IPhone you have already, turn on hotspot. From there, connect your new phone (from hard reset) to the hotspot via WiFi option. From there, somehow magically the two phones bypass the cellular data issue and are able to connect like usual. iTunes usually has nothing to do with the equation if you do this correctly.

Answer 5

My answer is very similar to that of Devyn.

I tried to activate via the Wi-Fi of my university, but I guess that the "activation server" is using a non standard (HTTP?) port that my university has blocked.

So instead of connecting to my university Wi-Fi:

1. I used my Android phone tethering (Settings > Tethering > Allow Tethering)
2. logged into the Wi-Fi tethering of my Android phone, and allocation proceeded without any hitch.

Answer 6

I was trying this on an iPhone 8 and for us it worked by just unlocking the SIM card (typing in the code instead of skipping this step).

I tried this after connecting the phone to my macbook. On the macbook I could see the phone popping up in finder. Finder wasn't able to activate the phone, but I could open the application "Console" and read the logs of the phone, which made me curious to try out the step written above. I do not really recall what was in there that made me do this step, I just remember seeing something like "couldn't locate sim".