Earlier this year, we shared that Android 15 would have a new feature to pause notifications. This was first seen in the initial developer preview of Google Android 15. It lets you silence back-to-back notifications.
However, in its first version, this feature could only mute the sound of notifications, not stop them from causing your phone to vibrate. Vibrations can be as disruptive as sound when you receive many notifications. Thankfully, Google is expected to fix this in the next Android 15 beta.
Mishaal Rahman, an expert on AOSP code writing for Android Authority, explored the latest Android 15 Beta 1.2 update and found something new about the notification cooldown feature that’s still being developed.
He managed to turn the feature back on by going to Settings → Notifications → Notification cooldown. During this process, Rahman spotted a new option called “Vibrate when unlocked” on the settings page. The description of this toggle indicates that if activated, the phone will only vibrate when the screen is unlocked, potentially cutting down on unwanted vibrations.
The upcoming beta update for Android 15 introduces settings to turn off repeated vibrations. If you switch on the “Vibrate when unlocked” feature, your phone will only vibrate if the screen is on and unlocked.
This is part of the larger notification cooldown feature. With this setup, your phone will only play a loud ringtone the first time an app sends a notification while your screen is off. Any notifications that follow, if you haven’t checked or interacted with the first one, will be quieter than the previous one.
Although this feature stops your phone from vibrating all the time, it could cause you to miss crucial notifications. If this happens, you can disable both the notification cooldown and its vibration setting.
Alternatively, you can adjust the setting from “Apply cooldown to all notifications” to “Apply cooldown to conversations.” This change allows you to get all subsequent notifications at full volume from apps that are not for messaging.
Google plans to launch Android 15 Beta 2 next month. The company might restore the notification cooldown page that was concealed in Android 15 Beta 1. Additionally, Google may add the “Vibrate when unlocked” toggle in this upcoming update to enhance the features further.
It’s also important to mention that the notification cooldown feature is only available on Pixel devices right now. Google usually tests new features on its devices first to collect feedback and make improvements.
We anticipate that other non-Pixel devices will get this feature when Android 15 is released to them, making the user experience more uniform across various Android devices.
What we think?
I think the new notification features in Android 15 will be really helpful. Being able to stop vibrations unless the phone screen is unlocked sounds great for reducing distractions.
However, I worry that I might miss important alerts if I don’t hear them the first time. I’m glad there are options to customise the settings, like choosing to apply cooldowns to just messaging apps. This could make managing notifications much easier.