iOS 15 will prioritize your notifications using on-device intelligence

Apple Iphone12pro Ios15 Notifications Lockscreen
Apple Iphone12pro Ios15 Notifications Lockscreen (Image credit: Apple)

What you need to know

  • Apple has announced some notable updates to notifications on the iPhone.
  • On-device intelligence will prioritize your notifications for you.

Notifications on iOS 15 have been redesigned to help you stay focused on the things that matter most.

Today was the first day of WWDC21 and, during the keynote, Apple announced that it is bringing some notable updates to how notifications are handled on the iPhone with iOS 15. The notifications have been redesigned, adding contact photos for people who message you and a larger app icon for other notifications.

They have also created a new notification summary that groups together the non-critical notifications. Those will be delivered at the appropriate times throughout the day so you aren't bogged down by continuous, less urgent notifications all day.

Notifications have been redesigned, adding contact photos for people and larger icons for apps that make them even easier to identify. To help reduce distraction, a new notification summary collects non-time-critical notifications for delivery at a more opportune time, such as in the morning and evening.

Even better, iOS will now arrange notifications by priority using on-device intelligence. The most urgent notifications will be delivered right away like messages from people, while others may be added to the notification summary.

Using on-device intelligence, notifications are arranged by priority, with the most relevant notifications rising to the top, and based on a user's interactions with apps. Urgent messages will be delivered immediately, so important communications will not end up in the summary, and it's easy to temporarily mute any app or messaging thread for the next hour or for the day.

The new features for notifications will roll out to developers in the iOS 15 beta today, to public beta users in July, and to all users when iOS 15 releases this fall.

Joe Wituschek
Contributor

Joe Wituschek is a Contributor at iMore. With over ten years in the technology industry, one of them being at Apple, Joe now covers the company for the website. In addition to covering breaking news, Joe also writes editorials and reviews for a range of products. He fell in love with Apple products when he got an iPod nano for Christmas almost twenty years ago. Despite being considered a "heavy" user, he has always preferred the consumer-focused products like the MacBook Air, iPad mini, and iPhone 13 mini. He will fight to the death to keep a mini iPhone in the lineup. In his free time, Joe enjoys video games, movies, photography, running, and basically everything outdoors.