I only get notifications when I unlock my iPhone

Depending on what notifications you want, you can change settings for certain apps or for your whole phone. Notifications appear when you swipe down from the top of your screen. Some notifications can also appear on your lock screen and home screen.

Important:

• Some of these steps work only on Android 10 and up. Learn how to check your Android version.
• Some of these steps require you to tap the screen.
• Call captioning only works on Pixel phones.

Use notifications

Clear notifications

• To clear one notification, swipe it left or right.
• To clear all notifications, scroll to the bottom of your notifications and tap Clear all.
• To clear all silent notifications, next to 'silent notifications', tap Close 
  

Tip: You can clear some notifications only when they've finished. For example, you can clear a music player notification after you stop the music.

Snooze notifications

Turn on snoozing

1. Open your phone's Settings app.
2. Tap Notifications.
3. Turn on Allow notification snoozing. 

Snooze a notification 

To snooze a notification, drag it slightly left or right, and then tap Snooze

Reply, archive, expand and more

• To expand a notification, tap the Down arrow 
  
  . Then, to act directly from a notification, tap an action, like Reply or Archive.
• Some apps show a dot when you get a notification. Touch and hold the app with the dot to see the oldest notification. Then, clear each to show the next. Learn about notification dots.

Control emergency broadcast notifications

Important: Settings can vary by phone. For more info, contact your device manufacturer.

You can turn alert types on or off, find past alerts and control sound and vibration.

1. On your phone, open the Settings app.
2. Tap Notifications
   
    Wireless emergency alerts.
3. Choose how often you want to receive alerts and which settings you want to turn on.

You can use this setting to manage certain emergency messages, like disaster warnings, threat notifications and AMBER alerts.

Choose how you're notified

Change notifications for your phone

Important: Settings can vary by phone. For more info, contact your device manufacturer.

1. Open your phone's Settings app.
2. Tap Notifications
   
   Notifications on the lock screen.
   • Choose your phone's notification defaults:
     • Show conversation, default and silent
     • Hide silent conversations and notifications
     • Don't show any notifications
   • To update more notification preferences, under 'General', turn notifications on or off:
     • Hide silent notifications in status bar
     • Allow notification snoozing
     • Notification dot on app icon
     • Enhanced notifications

Turn notifications on or off for certain apps

Important: Settings can vary by phone. For more info, contact your device manufacturer.

Option 1: In your settings app

1. Open your phone's Settings app.
2. Tap Notifications
   
   App settings.
3. Under 'Most recent', find apps that recently sent you notifications.
   • To find more apps, in the drop-down menu, tap All apps.
4. Tap the app.
5. Turn the app's notifications on or off.
   • You can turn off all notifications for a listed app.
   • To pick specific categories of notifications, tap the app's name.

Tip: If you don't see 'Recently sent', you're using an older Android version. Instead, tap App notifications and tap an app. You can turn notifications, notification dots and notification categories on or off. If an app has categories, you can tap a category for more options.

Option 2: On a notification

1. To find your notifications, from the top of your phone screen, swipe down.
2. Touch and hold the notification, and then tap settings
   
   .
3. Choose your settings:
   • To turn off all notifications, turn off All notifications. 
   • Turn on or off notifications that you want to receive.
   • To allow notification dots, turn on Allow notification dot.

Option 3: In the certain app

You can control many app notifications from a settings menu in the app. For example, an app could have a setting to choose the sound that the app's notifications make. To make these changes, open the app and search for the settings menu. 

Choose if notifications interrupt you or stay silent

Important: Settings can vary by phone. For more info, contact your device manufacturer.

On some Android devices, you can choose what kind of notifications an app sends you:

• Alerting: You'll hear a sound, get a message on your lock screen and find the app's icon in the status bar.
• Silent: Your phone won't make a sound or vibrate. But the notification will appear when you swipe down from the top of your screen.

Option 1: In your Settings app

1. Open your phone's Settings app.
2. Tap Apps and notifications
   
    Notifications.
3. Under 'Recently sent', tap an app. 
4. Tap a type of notification.
5. Choose your options:
   • Choose Alerting or Silent.
   • To see a banner for alerting notifications when your phone is unlocked, turn on Pop on screen.
   • If you chose 'Silent', you can turn Minimise on or off.

Option 2: On a notification 

1. After you swipe down from the top of your screen, drag the notification slightly right or left. Then tap Settings
   
   .
2. Tap Alerting or Silent
   
    Apply.  

Control how notifications show on your lock screen

Option 2: Show all notifications

Important: Settings can vary by phone. For more info, contact your device manufacturer.

1. Open your phone's Settings app.
2. Tap Apps and notifications 
   
    Notifications.
3. Under 'Lock screen', tap Notifications on lock screen or On lock screen.
4. Choose Show alerting and silent notifications.
   • On some phones, choose Show all notification content.

Tip: If you pick this option as your default, you can still restrict certain apps on your lock screen. You can have certain apps 'Hide sensitive notification content' or 'Don't show notifications at all' on your lock screen. Learn how to change notifications by app. 

Related resources

• Learn how to use lockdown
• Change volume, sound and vibrate settings
• Silence your phone with Do Not Disturb
• Find your chats and messages quickly

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