The Action Center in Windows 10 lets you keep track of all your notifications from various apps. As you install more applications, you'll want to customize your notifications so that you don't get overwhelmed. We'll show you how.
- Open Settings (Keyboard shortcut: Windows + I)
- Go to Settings > Notifications & actions
From here you can:
- Turn on/off tips about Windows
- Turn on/off app notifications
- Turn on/off notifications on the lock screen
- Turn on/off alarms, reminders, and incoming VOIP calls on the lock screen
- Turn on/off notifications while presenting
Remember, if you want to temporarily disable notifications, you can quickly do it with Quick Actions using the Quiet Hours button.
If you need more specific controls, scroll down for the notification settings for each app. You can completely turn on/off the notifications for each app by using the toggle next to the app's name. You can further customize each notification by tapping or clicking an app name.
You can choose to:
- Turn on/off notification banner
- Turn on/off sound when a notification arrives.
Customizing your Windows 10 notifications with these options give you more control over what you see or hear. For example, you can have a notification appear in Action Center for Twitter, but not necessarily have it pop up as a live banner. Likewise, you can have the notification arrive as a banner, but it will remain silent with no audible alert. This works really well for something like email, where you might want to see what has arrived but not get a notification banner for each new email, possibly disrupting you from work.
Are you customizing the way you receive notifications, or are you happy with the default options? We'd love to hear your setup.
If you think this guide is helpful, we have many more posts like this in our Windows 10 help, tips and tricks page.
Reader comments
How to customize your Windows 10 notifications
Email notifications aren't working for me
Email notification is the worst thing on Windows 10, also the App itself, the live tile is a mess, it shows deleted messages.
email app was broken for gmail as it wasnt updating or syncing but notification was working for outlook mail. Today MS released an update and the update might have fixed it. I still havent checked it as im at work.
Gmail has never worked for me on windows phone or windows anything.
I agree. I love Win10, but the mail app is terrible. It doesn't sync deleted emails and I almost never get any notifications.
Same here. It doesn't sync folders properly, it doesn't show the live tile correctly, it doesn't show notifications, etc. etc. Shame, because the app itself is better than the 8.1 version.
I get notifications if I'm on the start screen but only sometimes if I'm in an app.
Unless I missed something, you can't disable the notification for 1/3/8 hours like on Windows 8?
somehow when i was watching a movie the other day i turned off the notifications for a period of time. I have no clue how or where i did it smh
Seems that I have a bug there cause I see only 3 apps in the list on of them without a display name "Microsoft.Explorer.Notificatiosn.{....}
I see, someone is a City fan.
Mark a footy fan? Unlikely. Prove me wrong!
I'm from New York, so I follow NYC FC who are affiliated with Man City
As a Red Bulls fan, I'm sorry for you
I wish we could change the sound that individual apps make for notifications....
This
Yes!
Before the terrible mess is around right now with the Store and the Mail Apps, the Banners didn't work for the Mail App.
Also, they didn't work when I plug an external device, but in my other PC with the Preview Build 10166 it does show the Banner for new devices. Odd.
That need to add custom sounds
What about Apps being updated from the store? No nofications for that?
I've turned off sounds on my notifications and I'm still hearing sounds for new notifications.
Question, how come Cortana is in the app list for notification while mine wasn't there?
Why is this not in the sidebar menu like it is on a Mac...? So much easier...
I just turned it off, it sucks.
How to enable sports notifications with Cortana?
The only notifications I get in windows 10 are when I get an achievement in Xbox One. Suffice to say, it's fucking useless.
Nice
I am not getting notification banners for the sports, news or money app..only Flipboard and Mail email notifications. I tried everything to get the other app notifications..and nothing. Sports and News app did have notification banner updates originally, but then they stopped. Not sure why they stopped. Maybe because they are pinned to the start tiles? but Flipboard is pinned there and Mail app is pinned there so that cant be it. Tried toggling the on/off buttons for notifications, but didnt help. No one seems to know why they dont come in. I guess i have to uninstall and reinstall.