If an application or game is sending you too many notifications, you can follow these steps below to completely block future notifications from that app.
Some people have hundreds of applications and games installed on their smartphone. This means that notifications can sometimes get out of hand, but thankfully there is a way to ignore the ones we don’t want. For instance, there are some applications and games that I have zero use for the notifications they send me.
Some of them are nothing more than reminders to get us to use their application again, and this is horrible app design.
I would say that most applications and games have a way of turning off notifications from within the settings section of that particular application. Technically, the application developer could ignore that option if they really wanted to push a notification to you, but that tends to be rare. What I really dislike are the applications that refuse to add in this option inside the settings of their app.
Thankfully though, there’s a way to block notifications from the system level, and that’s what I want to show you how to do today on the Pixel and Pixel XL. There’s actually two ways of doing this. I’ll demonstrate one way in the guide below, and then show you both ways in the embedded video below.
Pixel Block Notifications
- Slow swipe the notification to the right until the Gear icon appears
- When you see the Gear icon, stop swiping and let go of the notification
- Tap on the Gear icon
- Tap the ‘Block All Notifications’ option
- Then tap on the ‘Done’ button at the bottom right of the notification
Explanation
There are a couple of reasons why I am only showing one method in the written guide here. For one, this method is much easier and quicker since you can block an application or game immediately when you receive a notification that annoys you. Also, the second method has been known for a while and I’ve written about it in previous device tutorials. Since the method detailed in the guide above is new to Android 7.0 Nougat, I thought it was best to discuss here.
As mentioned, you will need to wait until there’s a notification waiting for you from the application or game you want to block. Once you see that notification waiting for you in the Notification Panel, slowly start to swipe the notification to the right. You don’t want to swipe it too quickly, or you will just dismiss it. Just slowly swipe it to the right until you see a Gear icon appear to the left of the notification.
Once you see the Gear icon appear, go ahead and let your finger or thumb go from the notification (again, not in a swiping motion). From here, you can then tap on the Gear icon and you’ll be presented the notification options for that specific application or game. The notification options should look like the image above, and from here you have three different options to choose from on the Pixel and Pixel XL.
By default, it should be set on the Don’t Silence or Block option (unless you’ve changed this in the past). So you can choose to either Block All Notifications entirely, or you can choose to only Show Notifications Silently. Showing the notifications silently will still allow them to appear in your Notification Panel, but you will not hear any notification sounds, it will not make the phone vibrate, and the notification will not “peek” in from the top of the display.
Blocking all notifications sounds exactly like it is, and will prevent the all notifications from that particular application or game from being displayed entirely. You won’t be alerted via a notification sound or the phone vibrating, since notifications will be blocked from that app or game entirely. Once you choose the option you want for that app or game, go ahead and tap the Done button and it will save your choice.
If you make a mistake, or change your mind in the future, you can always adjust this option by diving into the Settings application, tapping on Notifications, and then tapping on the application or game you want to change.
