Related

Garmin Connect Android Notifications broken

7397559
9 days ago

Starting with the October 8th 2025 5.18 Android release, notifications sent from phone to watch no longer vibrate the watch.

I wear a Garmin Forerunner 255 and use a Google Pixel 9A with the latest version of Android as well as the most up to date security release. 

 If I set a timer or alarm on the watch, it will vibrate at the conclusion of said timer/alarm, but all notifications received on the phone sent to the watch simply do not vibrate it.

It is not related to “do not disturb”, that setting is turned off.

I downgraded to the 5.17.2 and the watch started to vibrate on phone notifications again. Therefore, as far as I can tell it is a software bug with Garmin Connect version 5.18.

EDIT: This seems to be related to Androids own "Do Not Distrub", previously Garmin Connect would ignore Androids Do Not Disturb setting, but now it is following it.

I have tried to escalate this to the Garmin Android Dev team (reachable at [email protected] - I'd suggest people also try to reach out), but the person who responded to my emails was unable to understand the issue, even after pointing them to this forum post & others on social media. 

  • 0 4 days ago

    This has been driving me crazy on my Forerunner 965 with latest 25.06 firmware. Since Garmin Connect updated 4 days ago, I no longer get any notifications to my watch. I've tried disabling/enabling them in Connect's settings, rebooting my watch, rebooting my phone, etc. I do keep my phone in DND and rely on the notifications coming to my watch to alert me of things. If this is actually an intentional change, there needs to be a setting added to disable it.

  • 0 4 days ago

    Here's the response I got from Garmin:

    Thank you for the confirmation and reply. So this issue was brought to our attention with a report that after setting an Android phone to do-not-disturb, notifications from the Connect app do not show at all on paired wearable, even though they do show if a user scrolls to the notifications widget. It was determined that this report was by design with the app functionality on an Android based device and a fix will not be put into place. We do apologize for the inconvenience.
    So it seems the official response is this is not a bug and will not be fixed.
  • 0 4 days ago in reply to 5305734

    Whoever said that is wrong. Since phonecalls still make my watch vibrate when my phone is in do not disturb mode, there is inconsistent behaviour therefore IT IS A BUG. 

    I will NOT STOP contacting Garmin until they fix it. And if they don't fix it, next watch I buy WILL NOT BE GARMIN 

  • 0 4 days ago in reply to 5305734

    Ha, that's bad, zero communication about the large change to the users as well. All I can say is that this will be my first and last Garmin

  • 0 4 days ago in reply to 7397559

    I've started contacting Garmin on as many channels as possible with the same message: that this is not a feature, it's a bug (proof: phonecalls still make my watch vibrate when phone in DND mode) and that the online community is becoming increasingly frustrated with their dismissive replies. I suggest everyone reading this post does the same, Let's make some noise about this... as the saying goes, the squeaky wheel gets the grease!

  • 0 4 days ago in reply to 4487079

    I've started contacting Garmin on as many channels as possible with the same message: that this is not a feature, it's a bug (proof: phonecalls still make my watch vibrate when phone in DND mode) and that the online community is becoming increasingly frustrated with their dismissive replies. I suggest everyone reading this post does the same, Let's make some noise about this... as the saying goes, the squeaky wheel gets the grease!

  • 0 3 days ago

    Just to raise awareness to Garmin: this happens to me as well. I used this setup for years now with my 965 being my third watch. I always have my phone in DnD, only calls from favorite contacts are allowed. I use this because only sometimes, when I don't wear my watch, I want to hear my phone's other notifications like apps and messages. That's when I turn DnD off. But my watch was always unaffected by whatever mode my phone is in. But now I started to miss notifications because my phone is in DnD but my watch is not vibrating. Other vibrations on the watch work fine (activities start/stop, phone disconnected, ...).

  • 0 3 days ago in reply to 5305734
    5305734 said:
    It was determined that this report was by design with the app functionality on an Android based device and a fix will not be put into place. We do apologize for the inconvenience.

    Thanks for reporting back from Garmin's strange world of support excuses, as this is quite bewildering.

    We need a way to make the phone silent and receive notifications on the watch. Otherwise what is the point of the smart watch if I have to have both my phone and my watch ring, beep and buzz at the same time?

    Besides not communicating this change clearly in any way: the watches already have a Do Not Disturb mode. So why it doesn't sync with the phone then? My watch does not go in DND mode when I enable it on my phone, or the other way around.

    This is either a bug or the worst implemented and documented feature I've seen.

    If I mute my ring and notification volume, and disable haptic feedback I can make my phone be mute without putting it into DND mode, but I have to dig in to menus for a while to switch between these modes instead of setting it to DND with one click.

    Putting our watch in DND mode without any visual indication is really irresponsible. I've already missed calls and notifications because of this. There is a lot to apologize for here, that's for sure. But this feels more like "sorry, but not sorry, good luck solving your issue that we created for you, bye".

  • 0 3 days ago in reply to Attila

    Garmin cares little about its customers’ wishes. For years, I—together with a few other users—have been trying to convince Garmin that a phone call should trigger more than a short beep and two brief vibrations on my Garmin smartwatch. I’ve missed so many calls. Maybe it’s about time to jump ship from Garmin. Or require all the Garmin Connect developers to wear an Android smartphone and a Garmin watch themselves. 24/7.

  • 0 3 days ago in reply to 4487079

    Even with DND on the phone off, I don't necessarily get notification alerts on the watch any longer. A weird behavior that I've observed is that I appear to get watch notification alerts if the phone's data is on cellular, but I DON'T if the phone is connected to Wifi! 

    Update... it's just occurred to me that, on those occasions on cellular data, I was also in an active activity on the watch. So this might have been the source of the different behavior.