iPhone 12 Pro Max not getting text notifications? Fix

Is your iPhone 12 Pro Max suddenly not ringing or making any sound when you receive an inbound message? Have you recently missed an important text because your iPhone 12 Pro Max didn’t notify you? Wondering why you didn’t get an alert when someone recently texted you? No text or message notification coming in even from your favorites or in emergencies?

If so, you are not alone! Several people have reported their iPhone 12 Pro Max has suddenly stop alerting them when new texts or messages arrive. Naturally, this issue causes a lot of trouble for folks, especially when missing those critical messages from family, friends, and workplaces.

It’s really frustrating when your iPhone is not receiving text notifications!
how it’s supposed to work: you receive any new message, your iPhone 12 Pro Max alerts you with a sound, an on-screen alert, and a vibration.

This process should work for all new incoming messages, whether it’s an iMessage or an SMS text. But if you find it’s not working as it should, and your iPhone 12 Pro Max not alerting you to new texts, we’ve got some tips to fix it quickly!
See also: iPhone 12 Pro Max not receiving text messages? Fix

Check Your iPhone Text Message Sound Effect & Select a Text Tone

Yup, sometimes it’s the easy things that fall through the cracks. So let’s make sure that you selected a tone for your incoming text messages!

Go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics > and scroll down to the section Sounds and Vibration Patterns. In this section, look for Text Tone.

If this says None, tap it and change the alert to something you like.

Use Your Text Tone Default!

Here is another quick solution, just change your text sound to the default and simple Ding or Note. Readers noticed problems with texts not consistently sounding alerts when using longer alert tones. So stick with the defaults!

To update, go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics > Text Tone and change to the default, listed in parenthesis such as Note (Default.)

Alerts Not Sounding For Just A Few Contacts? Look at your custom settings for each contact

Pull up one of the contacts that’s not alerting you (open either the Phone or Contacts app)
Tap Edit in the top right corner
Scroll down to Text Tone and look at the selected sound
If none is listed, tap and select a new Alert Tone from the list and tap Done

Look at Date & Time

It’s always good to check that our date and time are correct and ideally toggle on “Set Automatically.” If your iPhone 12 Pro Max time is incorrect, this may explain why you aren’t getting notifications and alerts promptly.

A mismatch with your Date&Time can cause a whole host of problems. So let’s check it out. Go to Settings > General > Date & Time and toggle on Set Automatically. If this is already on, toggle it off, wait 20 seconds, and turn it back on again.

Check your Message app settings for Filtering Unknown Senders and Blocked Contacts

If you are not receiving texts from folks and businesses that aren’t in your Contacts app, you likely enabled the settings for Filter Unknown Senders. This feature automatically turns off notifications for messages from people and others who aren’t saved in your Contacts.

To change this setting, go to Settings > Messages > Unknown & Spam and turn off Filter Unknown Senders.

Take a look at your Blocked Contacts list

You may have inadvertently added someone to your blocked list.

If you blocked someone in FaceTime, iMessage, the Phone app, or in the Mail app, that block is active on all those apps. So when you block a phone number or contact, messages that are sent or received by that contact won’t be delivered. Blocked contacts can still leave a voicemail, but you won’t get a notification for that voicemail. And when you block an email address from Mail, it goes to the trash folder.

To look at your blocked contacts list, go to Settings > Messages. Under SMS/MMS, tap Blocked Contacts. Swipe to remove them from the blocked list.

You can also find this blocked contact list in the these apps:

The Phone App. Go to Settings > Phone. Tap Blocked Contacts to see the list
FaceTime. Go to Settings > FaceTime. Under Calls, tap Blocked Contacts
The Mail App. Go to Settings > Mail. Under Threading, tap Blocked.

Update Notification Banners

Often, your new text notifications appear but disappear so quickly that you may just miss seeing them. Fortunately, there’s a way to change your text banners from temporary to persistent.

Persistent banners require you to take action before they disappear, while temporary banners go away after a short time on-screen. Both types appear at the top of your screen.

So if you’re missing notifications, try changing to persistent banners and see if this makes a difference. Go to Settings > Notifications > Messages and just below Show as Banners, tap on the icon for Persistent.

Confirm your selection by checking that the word Persistent is circled.

No Text or Message Notification on iPhone 12 Pro Max? Check Do Not Disturb (DND)

First, check and see if you’ve accidentally (or purposefully) turned on Do Not Disturb. Go to Settings > Do Not Disturb and make sure it’s toggled OFF. Or swipe up control center and look for the crescent moon icon. If it’s highlighted, it’s on. Tap it to turn off.

While you’re at it, also check Do Not Disturb While Driving
Apple added a great feature to silence notifications for folks while driving. While handy, if DND while driving stays on, you won’t get any notifications and your screen remains dark–no alerts appear on the screen.

So if you’re experiencing problems with message alerts, check that this setting isn’t inadvertently ON.

Go to Settings > Do Not Disturb > and scroll down to the area marked Do Not Disturb While Driving. Your options are Automatically, While Connected to Car Bluetooth, or Manually. If set to Automatically, DND is active when it detects motion similar to driving, even if you’re a passenger!

For that reason, we recommend setting it to Manually and toggling on and off via Control Center.

To quickly access DND while driving, swipe on Control Center and locate the car icon. If it’s highlighted, it’s on. Tap to turn off.

If you don’t see this setting in the Control Center, open your Control Center Settings and add it to Customize Controls.

Contact Specific Do Not Disturb
If you notice that only specific contacts don’t show or play alerts, then make sure Do Not Disturb isn’t on for that particular contact.

To check, scroll through your messages and look to the left of each conversation’s name. If you see a crescent moon icon next to the contact, you’ve somehow activated Do Not Disturb Mode for that person/contact.

Check if you accidentally turned on Hide Alerts

Sometimes the crescent moon icon doesn’t even show up when DND is activated for a single contact, so it’s a good idea to check that contact, even if you don’t see the crescent moon.

Tap the Message thread and then tap on the name at the top. Edit the contact’s details by pressing the “i” and turn OFF Hide Alerts (or Do Not Disturb.)

Alternatively, if you already know which contacts’ texts are not alerting, tap on a message from the contact and press the “i” and toggle OFF Hide Alerts.

Look at Bluetooth

If you’ve recently connected to a Bluetooth device, sometimes that connection remains and iOS sends alerts to it rather than your iPhone.

To check, go to Settings > Bluetooth and check if any of your Bluetooth devices are connected and routing sound. If so, disconnect or unpair that Bluetooth device.

Alternatively, if you’re not currently using any Bluetooth device, disconnect devices by swiping up Control Center or turn Bluetooth off by going to Settings > Bluetooth > Off.

Paired with an Apple Watch?

If your iPhone pairs to an Apple Watch, by design your paired iPhone does not chime when a new text arrives. Instead, Apple routes your alerts to your Apple Watch, especially when the iPhone is locked.

As of now, there is no option to play a sound alert on BOTH your Apple Watch and your iPhone at the same time. It’s one or the other, based on the locked status of your phone.

The rule of thumb is if your phone is unlocked, notifications go to the iPhone. If your phone is locked, notifications go to your watch.

If you’re experiencing a problem with notifications not routing to your Apple Watch correctly, it’s best to unpair and then repair your Apple Watch to your iPhone.

Check Your Side or Ring/Volume (Mute) Switch

Take a look at your device’s silent switch button and toggle it OFF.

If your switch shows orange, it’s on. That means it’s in silent mode and vibrates for all alerts and incoming calls
When in silent mode, the alarms you set in the Clock app still sound and calls from Favorite contacts still ring.

Change What Sends & Receives

Go to Settings > Messages > Send & Receive. Look under the section: iMessage At Can reach you. If checked, deselect your email address. Select only your phone number and see if that solves the problem.

Turn Notifications ON

It’s common to turn notifications off inadvertently. So best to make sure they are indeed on. Check Settings > Notifications > Messages > Toggle ON Allow Notifications.

Next, make sure you choose an excellent alert sound. Go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics > Text Tones. And pick an alert sound that you like and that you’ll definitely hear.

No notifications or alerts when the phone is locked?

Not getting notified of messages coming in when iPhone 12 Pro Max is locked? If you don’t see or hear any alerts when your iPhone 12 Pro Max locks, enable the Show on Lock Screen setting.

Go to Settings > Notifications > Messages and verify that Show on Lock Screen is toggled on.

For sound alerts, also check that Settings > Notifications > Messages > Sounds has an alert type selected and does not display None unless that’s the setting you want.

Go to Settings > Face ID. Enter your passcode to validate access
Scroll down to Allow Access hen Locked
Toggle On Notification Center
And toggle on anything else you want to appear on your device’s Lock Screen.

Update Your iPhone to the Latest Version of iOS

It’s common for iOS updates to introduce new problems to your iPhone. In fact, previous iOS updates have been known to cause problems with text notifications not working on iPhone 12 Pro Max.

When this happens, Apple usually releases a new update in the next couple of weeks to fix it. Make sure you’re running the latest version of iOS so you benefit from Apple’s repair patches.

To update your iPhone software:

Connect your iPhone to a working Wi-Fi network.
Go to Settings > General > Software Update.
Wait for your iPhone to check for new software updates.
Download and install any available iOS updates.

Restart your iPhone

If nothing helped thus far, restart your iDevice by going to settings > General > Shut Down and sliding it off. Then turn on as usual.

If that doesn’t help, try a forced restart

Press and quickly release the Volume Up button. Then press and quickly release the Volume Down button. Finally, press and hold the Side button until you see the Apple logo
A forced restart is a hardware level restart of your device. It immediately cuts power and interrupts all processes. That means it clears what’s in the RAM, which in turn often fixes minor issues. And don’t worry, there’s no data loss–all your apps, games, photos, documents and login settings remain as is!

After performing a forced restart, make sure you check your Notification Settings to ensure everything is set-up as you want. Sometimes a forced reboot changes specific settings back to defaults. So the best insurance is to double or even triple check!

Reset Network Settings

Sometimes your network needs a refresh which in turn refreshes your connections to Apple’s Messages server. So let’s reset your network settings by going to Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings.

Don’t worry; this action DOES NOT impact your data, including apps, photos, documents, files, and so forth. It does wipe out any WiFi passwords, so write those down before you reset your network settings.

Reset all Settings

If none of the tips work for you, let’s try and reset all your iPhone 12 Pro Max settings. Don’t worry; this action DOES NOT impact your data.

But it does return all your personalized settings to defaults, meaning you need to re-enter things like passwords, Touch ID fingerprints, WiFi passcodes and so forth. So, yup, it’s very time-consuming, but many of our readers report it works.

Go to Settings > General > Reset > Reset All Settings