Not getting notifications from an app on iPhone? The fixes
An app can only ask to notify you. Whether the notification lights up your screen, waits quietly in Notification Center or gets held back until later is up to iOS, and iOS has more places to hold one back than most people know about. Nearly every missing notification is one of them, not a broken app. Here is where to look, in order.
Where notifications go
Every notification passes through a handful of gates on its way to you. Any one of them can stop it, delay it or deliver it somewhere you were not looking:
- Permission. Whether the app may notify you at all, and where: the Lock Screen, Notification Center, banners.
- Focus. Do Not Disturb, Sleep, Work and the rest silence every app that is not on their allowed list. A Focus can switch itself on by schedule, or because you turned it on on your iPad or Mac.
- Scheduled Summary. Holds an app's notifications back and delivers them in a bundle at the times you set.
- Apple Intelligence. On iPhones that have it, the Reduce Interruptions Focus and Intelligent Breakthrough & Silencing decide for themselves which notifications are important enough to show.
- The app itself. Its own settings, and whether it has anything scheduled to send.
Look at the top of your Lock Screen and in the status bar. A small moon, bed, briefcase or person icon means a Focus is on, and a Focus is the single most common reason notifications seem to stop.
The fixes, in order
Try them one at a time. The first three cover most cases.
- Check the app is allowed to notify you. Open Settings → Notifications and tap the app. Make sure Allow Notifications is on, and that under Alerts the Lock Screen, Notification Center and Banners are all ticked. An app that is allowed but has every alert unticked delivers nothing you will ever see.
- Check for a Focus. Open Control Center and look at the Focus button. If one is on, turn it off, or keep it and let the app through: open Settings → Focus, tap the Focus, tap Apps, then add the app under Allow Notifications From. If a Focus keeps coming back on its own, check its schedule on the same screen, and check whether Share Across Devices is on in Settings → Focus, which turns a Focus on here whenever you turn it on on your iPad or Mac.
- Check Scheduled Summary. In Settings → Notifications, tap the app and look under Notification Delivery. If it says Scheduled Summary, switch it to Immediate Delivery. You only see this choice if Scheduled Summary is turned on.
- Check what Apple Intelligence is filtering. On an iPhone with Apple Intelligence, the Reduce Interruptions Focus and the Intelligent Breakthrough & Silencing option in other Focuses silence what they judge unimportant. Turn the Focus off, or add the app to its allowed list as in the second step: an app you allow by name is always let through.
- Turn off Low Power Mode. Open Settings → Battery and switch it off. It does not block notifications, but it cuts background work, and that can delay the ones an app has to prepare or fetch first.
- Open the app. Some apps plan their notifications ahead of time on your iPhone and top the plan up when you open them. If you have not opened one in a while, its plan may simply have run out.
- Check the app's own settings. Many apps have notification switches of their own, separate from iOS. At the bottom of the app's page in Settings → Notifications there is often a link straight to them.
- Restart your iPhone. It fixes a stuck notification service more often than it should.
- Update iOS and the app. Notification bugs get fixed in point releases, on both sides.
- Delete and reinstall the app. The last resort. iOS forgets the app's permission when you delete it and asks again the first time the app wants to notify you, so be ready to tap Allow. Check what the app keeps on your iPhone before you delete it.
Matching the symptom
They are in Notification Center, but never light up the Lock Screen
Either Lock Screen is unticked under the app's Alerts, or your Lock Screen is set to show a number instead of the notifications themselves. In Settings → Notifications, choose Stack or List instead of Count. You can also pinch the notifications on the Lock Screen to change the layout.
They arrive, but silently
Check that your iPhone is not in Silent Mode, then check Sounds on the app's page in Settings → Notifications.
They all arrive at once, hours late
That is Scheduled Summary delivering its bundle, or a Focus ending and releasing what it held. Switch the app to Immediate Delivery, or let it through the Focus.
They go to my Apple Watch, not my iPhone
That is by design. While your iPhone is locked and your Apple Watch is on your wrist and unlocked, notifications go to the watch. Unlock your iPhone and they come to the phone instead.
They stopped after an iOS update or a new iPhone
Open the app once. Apps that schedule their notifications on the phone need to run before anything is scheduled again, and a restored iPhone does not always carry those plans across. Then go through the first three fixes, because an update or a restore can also bring a Focus or a summary setting with it.
Dailies notifications
If the quiet app is ours, a few things specific to Dailies:
- Quotes arrive inside the hours you chose. Open Personalize → Daily dose to see how many you get a day, the hours they are allowed to reach you and the days of the week. If the window runs from 9am to 5pm and you are checking at 8am, nothing is due yet. Inside the window they come at moments you did not pick, on purpose.
- A Focus holds them. Dailies sends ordinary notifications and never marks a quote as Time Sensitive, so any Focus that has not allowed Dailies will keep them back. Add Dailies to the Focus you use if you want quotes during it.
- Opening the app tops them up. Dailies plans its quotes ahead of time on your iPhone, with no internet needed, and refreshes the plan every time you open it. If you have not opened it for a long stretch, open it once and the next ones are scheduled.
- If you said no during setup, iOS will not ask again. Turn notifications on in Settings → Dailies → Notifications.
Still nothing? Write to help@mydailies.app and a person will answer. The help page has the short version, and a quote can also sit on your Lock Screen without a notification at all: see how to put quotes on your iPhone Lock Screen.
Questions
Why am I suddenly not getting notifications on my iPhone?
Most often a Focus has switched on, by schedule or from another of your Apple devices. After that, check the app's permission in Settings, then Notifications, and whether it has been moved into Scheduled Summary. A broken app is the least likely cause.
How do I know if a Focus is on?
A Focus shows its icon in the status bar and at the top of the Lock Screen, such as a moon for Do Not Disturb or a bed for Sleep. Open Control Center to see which one is on and to turn it off.
What are Time Sensitive notifications?
Notifications an app marks as needing your attention now, such as a delivery at the door. If you allow them, they get through a Focus and skip Scheduled Summary. Not every app uses them, and Apple asks apps to keep them for things that are genuinely urgent.
Does Low Power Mode stop notifications?
No, but it can delay them. Low Power Mode cuts background work, so notifications that an app has to prepare or fetch in the background may arrive later than usual.
Why do my notifications go to my Apple Watch instead of my iPhone?
When your iPhone is locked and your Apple Watch is on your wrist, notifications go to the watch. Unlock the iPhone and they come to the phone.
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