Notifications are a great way to keep up to date with things as they happen, but you’ll need to use them selectively.
It’s important to know when a colleague has messaged or someone wants to start a video call, but breaking celebrity news or an antivirus software deal will do more harm than good to your productivity.
All notifications are disruptive by nature, but it’s particularly annoying when you receive something that’s totally irrelevant. It happens all too often, whether you’re using a phone, tablet, laptop or desktop PC.
But on devices running Windows 11, there are lots of ways to control the flood of notifications reaching you. Here are five key ways to do just that.
Decide which apps can send notifications
This is the most obvious one, but also the most important. Installing any app means you technically consent to it sending you notifications, so you’ll have to turn these off manually.
- Head to Settings > System > Notifications and scroll down to ‘Notifications from apps and other senders’
- Look through the list and turn off the toggle next to any you don’t want. All changes you make here will be saved immediately
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- For more granular control, click the right arrow next to any app. Here, you can choose how you’d like notifications to be displayed, how much of a priority it is and whether to play a sound
Anyron Copeman / Foundry
Check in-browser notifications
When visiting some sites, you might be asked if you’d like to be sent notifications. If you click ‘Allow’, these can be sent to your desktop at any time.
You can disable notifications for your chosen web browser in Settings, but this is an all or nothing approach. To control which websites can send notifications, you’ll need to access your web browser settings instead.
On Google Chrome:
- Click the three dots in the top-right and select ‘Settings’
- Head to Privacy and security > Site settings > Notifications
- Under ‘Customised behaviours’, see which sites are ‘Allowed to send notifications’
- For any you’d like to stop, click the three dots and choose either ‘Remove’ (to turn them off) or ‘Block’ (to stop them from ever asking again)
Anyron Copeman / Foundry
On Microsoft Edge:
- Click the three dots in the top-right and select ‘Settings’
- Head to ‘Cookies and site permissions’, then scroll down and select ‘Notifications’
- As with Chrome, click the three dots next to any in the ‘Allow’ list you’d like to remove, and choose ‘Remove’ or ‘Block’
Anyron Copeman / Foundry
If you’re using a different web browser, it’s a similar process.
Set a schedule for do not disturb
On Windows 11, the Do not disturb feature blocks all incoming notifications – aside from those you set as ‘priority’.
To turn it on, head to Settings > System > Notifications and click the toggle next to ‘Do not disturb’.
From here, you can also set a schedule for when Do not disturb is active. The default is 11pm to 7am, but this can be customised to your liking.
There are also four other times Do not disturb is automatically active. Uncheck the box next to any of these to turn them off:
- When duplicating your display (priority notification banners are also hidden)
- When playing a game
- When using an app in full-screen model (priority notification banners are also hidden
- For the first hour after a Windows feature update
Anyron Copeman / Foundry
Set priority notifications
Within the same section of Settings, you’ll also see the option to specify which notifications are considered priority. Incoming calls and reminders are selected by default, but you can uncheck the box to turn either off.
You’ll also see a list of priority apps. Click the three dots next to any of these and choose ‘Remove’ to stop them being a priority, or ‘Add apps’ to add new ones to the list.
Anyron Copeman / Foundry
Use focus sessions regularly
If you need to get something specific done, you certainly don’t want to be interrupted by notifications. Windows 11’s Focus tool can be set to turn on Do not disturb for a specific time, as well as disabling badges and flashing on taskbar apps.
Head to Settings > System > Focus to customise any of these or the countdown timer that will appear in the Clock app.
Anyron Copeman / Foundry
You can start a session directly from Settings, but it’s easier via the Clock app. Focus sessions is the screen you’ll be presented with as soon as you open it.
Anyron Copeman / Foundry
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Author: Anyron Copeman, Senior Staff Writer
As the resident expert on Windows, Senior Staff Writer Anyron’s main focus is PCs and laptops. Much of the rest of his time is split between smartphones, tablets and audio, with a particular focus on Android devices.