iPhone notifications not showing can come down to a Focus left on, an app with Allow Notifications turned off or a mute on one of its alerts. Check Control Center first, because a Focus can turn on by schedule or from another device and silence alerts you expected.
A missing sound is a separate problem, because notification sounds do not play while the iPhone is on silent or the volume is turned all the way down. Look for the alert on the Lock Screen before changing any settings.
iPhone Notifications Not Showing While a Focus Is On
Open Control Center and look at the Focus control. If a Focus such as Do Not Disturb or Work is showing, tap it to turn it off, and if only the Focus icon appears, no Focus is on.
A Focus can start without you touching it, because it can be scheduled to turn on at certain times or after certain actions. With Share Across Devices turned on, a Focus switched on from an Apple Watch or iPad applies to the iPhone as well.
To let certain people or apps through a Focus, open Settings > Focus, tap the Focus and tap People or Apps. Select Allow Notifications From, then add the contacts or apps you want to hear from.
The Driving Focus can allow people but not apps, while Sleep and Do Not Disturb add options such as silencing notifications only when the iPhone is locked. For one contact, open Contacts, tap Edit, tap Ringtone or Text Tone and turn on Emergency Bypass, and that contact’s sounds and vibrations come through even when everything else is silenced.
Each App Has Its Own Notification Settings
- Open Settings and tap Notifications.
- Tap the app that is not alerting you below Notification Style.
- Turn on Allow Notifications.
- Under Alerts, choose whether notifications appear on the Lock Screen, in Notification Center or as banners.
- If you use Scheduled Summary, choose Immediate Delivery under Notification Delivery.
- Turn on Badges to show a count on the app icon.
Swiping left on an alert and tapping Options offers Mute for 1 Hour, Mute for Today, View Settings and Turn Off, so an app that went quiet after you cleared one of its alerts may have been muted from there. Apps that support Critical Alerts still come through a Focus or a muted iPhone once Critical Alerts is turned on for them under Notification Style.
Scheduled Summary and the Count View Change When and How Alerts Appear
A notification summary gathers alerts from the apps you choose and delivers them at set times of day, so those apps can look silent between summaries. Open Settings > Notifications > Scheduled Summary to turn it off, or tap A to Z and turn off the apps that should alert you right away.
A Lock Screen set to Count shows only the number of notifications. Choose Stack to group alerts by app, or choose List to show Lock Screen alerts as a list, from Settings > Notifications.
Show Previews under Settings > Notifications sets when previews appear, with the choices Always, When Unlocked and Never. Previews can include message text from Messages and Mail, and each app can override the setting.
Messages Has Its Own Mute and Spam Filters
A muted conversation stops notifications for that conversation only. Open the conversation in Messages, tap the image or icon at the top and turn off Hide Alerts. Messages also sends no alert for each new message while the app is open and active on the iPhone.
Messages can filter texts from unknown senders into a separate folder, and with Screen Unknown Senders on, those messages and anything flagged as spam send no notification. They wait in the Unknown Senders filter or the Spam folder, and moving a message out of Spam or marking the sender as known brings notifications back.
An Apple Watch Gets the Alert While the iPhone Is Locked
With an Apple Watch, notifications go to the watch or the iPhone but not both. An unlocked iPhone gets them, while a locked or sleeping iPhone passes them to the watch unless the watch is locked too. Reading or dismissing an alert on the watch also dismisses it on the iPhone.
Alerts go to the iPhone instead when the watch and iPhone disconnect, when the watch is locked or when Do Not Disturb is on. A watch in Low Power Mode turns off notifications while the iPhone is not nearby and retrieves them once an hour. Third-party apps reach the watch only while the paired iPhone is connected to a network.
To choose where an app’s alerts go, open the Apple Watch app on the iPhone, tap My Watch, tap Notifications and tap the app. Mirror my iPhone copies the iPhone settings, while Custom offers Allow Notifications, Send to Notification Center and Notifications Off for apps that allow it. Alerts that arrive late or land on the iPhone after an update are among the common watchOS 27 problems.
Low Power Mode Turns Off Email Fetch and Background App Refresh
If mail or app alerts arrive late while the battery icon is yellow, turn Low Power Mode off from Control Center. It switches off email fetch and Background App Refresh, and it turns off by itself once the iPhone charges to 80 percent.
Alerts that went missing right after updating are among the common iOS 27 problems, and a newer point release may resolve them. If the settings above are right and alerts still do not arrive, restart the iPhone, or use a force restart on any model if it is frozen or unresponsive.
To restart, hold a volume button and the side button until the power-off slider appears, drag the slider and wait 30 seconds, then hold the side button until the Apple logo appears.
