Help Is there no longer a way to adjust the notification sound volume independent of the ringer volume?

Stuntman · Mar 9, 2017

For years, the volume settings had a ringer volume setting independent of the notification volume. I took advantage of this feature so that when I go to bed, phone calls would ring and be able to wake me up while notification sounds from email and messages are silent. I would lower the notification volume to 0 while keeping the ringer volume on a low setting. I used an app with widgets so I can quickly change these settings by simply tapping on a widget.

It seems that the more recent versions of Android no longer have a separate notification volume setting and a separate ringtone setting. Both types of sounds are now linked together. I can no longer easily silent the notification sounds of all of my apps while keeping the ringer volume non-silent. This is an issue for me because I do on call work. I may need to be called in the middle of the night. I need my ringer to be on. However, I don't want to be awaken by an email or text message.

I tried the do not disturb feature, but it doesn't allow phone calls to ring while app notifications to be silent. If I set the DND feature to priority notifications, I get message notification sounds. Is there no longer a way for me to easily silence notifications while not silencing the ringer as well?

girolez · Mar 9, 2017

Hi

What phone and android version do you have. All the settings you are reporting missing are available on my Samsung devices running 6.0.1 and 7.0

dontpanicbobby · Mar 9, 2017

On my HTC running 7.0 you change the notification sound to silent but I see what you mean about ringtones & notifications being linked now.

Hadron · Mar 9, 2017

I can change them separately, but they are linked by default (I have a check box to link them or not), but I'm using 5.0. I guess you could see whether something like Tasker or an audio profile app can do it - if the settings are still distinct in the OS but linked in the UI that might be possible, if there is no longer a distinction under the hood then it won't be.

tommo47 · Mar 9, 2017

On my HTC M9, if I select DND-Priority I can switch off everything but calls and can further restrict calls to various categories. Have you not got those options?

PurrsSW · Mar 10, 2017

On both my Note 4 and my S7 Edge, those distinctions can be made but not immediately noticeable-at least not for me. I'm still on Marshmallow, and when you hit the volume button, at first, you'll only see the one slider for 'ringtone', but there's a tiny drop-down pointer (V) at the top right and if you tap that, you'll see all the rest of the sliders available.

dontpanicbobby · Mar 10, 2017

I think he fixed it.

Stuntman · Mar 11, 2017

girolez said:
Hi

What phone and android version do you have. All the settings you are reporting missing are available on my Samsung devices running 6.0.1 and 7.0

I'm using a Nexus 6P running Android 7.1.1.

Stuntman · Mar 11, 2017

tommo47 said:
On my HTC M9, if I select DND-Priority I can switch off everything but calls and can further restrict calls to various categories. Have you not got those options?

View attachment 117447 View attachment 117448 View attachment 117449 View attachment 117450

On my Nexus 6P, I have the same settings. However, if I set it Priority for calls only, I still get notifications from FB Messenger and WhatsApp.

PurrsSW · Mar 12, 2017

Stuntman said:
On my Nexus 6P, I have the same settings. However, if I set it Priority for calls only, I still get notifications from FB Messenger and WhatsApp.

Have you shut off notifications from both those apps? That may be what you have to do to get rid of them. This doesn't look to be a volume problem but an app problem instead: they've developed a mind of their own and aren't listening to you - and I'm only partially kidding. Shut them off in application manager and in the settings of each app, particularly if they're ignoring your preferences. It may not be at all what you don't know about your device that is the problem. Your problem is coming from those two apps. In your place, I'd have deleted both by now, because either I own my time or they do.

I've noticed a lot of old familiar apps that I never had any trouble with before, including email apps, recently started bothering me with notifications (when I wasn't even allowing them in app settings!) even news feeds that I hadn't asked for and they were the very devil to find and stop. My Opera Mini browser started doing that with a news feed, at all hours of day and night, had never done it before, and I had to go into application manager and stop all notifications from it. If it manages to recover from that and bothers me again, I'll delete it, because at that point, it has become malware.

tommo47 · Mar 12, 2017

Stuntman said:
On my Nexus 6P, I have the same settings. However, if I set it Priority for calls only, I still get notifications from FB Messenger and WhatsApp.

Mmm, I don't have either of those two apps, but I think @PurrsSW may have a valid point. Looking at 'Notifications' in each of my apps there are more options than previously.

PurrsSW · Mar 12, 2017

tommo47 said:
Mmm, I don't have either of those two apps, but I think @PurrsSW may have a valid point. Looking at 'Notifications' in each of my apps there are more options than previously.

View attachment 117569

Now, that's really sneaky! An 'override' enabled by default?!
I just got a bunch of app updates and now I'm going to go check them all too. Thanks for the heads-up!

Stuntman · Mar 14, 2017

PurrsSW said:
Have you shut off notifications from both those apps? That may be what you have to do to get rid of them. This doesn't look to be a volume problem but an app problem instead: they've developed a mind of their own and aren't listening to you - and I'm only partially kidding. Shut them off in application manager and in the settings of each app, particularly if they're ignoring your preferences. It may not be at all what you don't know about your device that is the problem. Your problem is coming from those two apps. In your place, I'd have deleted both by now, because either I own my time or they do.

I've noticed a lot of old familiar apps that I never had any trouble with before, including email apps, recently started bothering me with notifications (when I wasn't even allowing them in app settings!) even news feeds that I hadn't asked for and they were the very devil to find and stop. My Opera Mini browser started doing that with a news feed, at all hours of day and night, had never done it before, and I had to go into application manager and stop all notifications from it. If it manages to recover from that and bothers me again, I'll delete it, because at that point, it has become malware.

It is just way too cumbersome to have to go into every single app I use and turn off notifications whenever I go to bed and then go into every single app I use an turn the notifications back on. In previous versions of Android, I just turn down the volume for notifications and every single app I use no longer makes a notification sound. Then I can just turn up the notification volume and every single app plays notification sounds again. I use a widget to do both of these actions with a single tap on the home screen. Now, my app also turns off the ringer which I don't want to happen when I turn off notification sounds.

Stuntman · Mar 15, 2017

I found the answer by Codesplice in the Nexus 6P forum. http://androidforums.com/threads/an...gtone-and-notifications.1113500/#post-7514660

Basically, in the settings, the notification section allows you to set certain apps to override the Do Not Disturb (DND) feature. My messaging apps had the DND override on, unbeknownst by me. I went through and turned off the DND override feature for all my messaging apps and only set it on for my alarm and phone apps.

vickersg · Mar 26, 2017

I think it is being over thought when you hit the volume up button tap the V top right of the soundbar and this opens the other options.

Stuntman · Mar 27, 2017

vickersg said:
I think it is being over thought when you hit the volume up button tap the V top right of the soundbar and this opens the other options.

There used to be separate volume settings for ringtone and for notifications. Now both are rolled up into the same one. I can no longer set different volumes for ringtone and notifications.

vickersg · Mar 27, 2017

I get this when I expand the volume by tapping where the ^ is in this screen shot

Help Is there no longer a way to adjust the notification sound volume independent of the ringer volume?

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