Fortunately, Windows 11 lets you customize how notifications work on your PC. In this guide, we’ll explain how you can customize Windows 11 notifications to keep your notifications panel lean so it’s less intrusive.
1. Disable Banner Notifications
If you get distracted looking at the banner notification slide at the bottom-right of your screen while you’re working, you can disable notifications entirely. You can disable them from the Settings app.
Start by pressing Win + I and navigate to System > Notifications, and turn the toggle off from the top.
You’ll no longer see banner notifications. If you want to re-enable banner notifications, just turn the toggle back on.
2. Disable Badge Notifications
You’ll see a counter at the extreme right of the taskbar for notifications. The number represents the unopened notifications you currently have in your notifications panel. If you find it distracting or want a cleaner taskbar from the Settings app, you can disable this counter.
Start by pressing Win + I to launch the Settings app and navigate to Personalization > Taskbar > Taskbar behaviors. Uncheck the box next to the Show badges (unread messages counter) on taskbar apps option.
Once you’ve disabled badge notifications, you won’t see the counter in your taskbar even if you have unopened notifications.
3. Use Focus Assist
If you don’t want to disable notifications, but only pause them while you’re focusing on work, use Focus Assist.
You can press Win + A to enable Focus Assist. Alternatively, if you want to take the longer route, start by pressing Win + I and navigating to System > Focus assist. You’ll have two Focus Assist options here:
Priority list: Disables all notifications that aren’t in your priority list. You can change the priority list by clicking on Customize priority list. Alarms only: Disables all notifications except alarms.
If you want a summary of missed notifications, check the box next to the option called Show a summary of what I missed when focus assist was on option.
This way, you’ll be able to focus on the task at hand without getting distracted by notifications every few minutes.
4. Change Banner Notifications Duration
You can customize each banner notification’s duration on your PC. If you want to keep the notification on the screen for a longer or shorter duration, you can change this from the Settings app.
Press Win + I and then navigate to Accessibility > Visual effects. Change the duration by selecting an option from the dropdown next to the Dismiss notifications after this amount of time option.
If you select 7 seconds, the notifications will stay on your screen for 7 seconds.
5. Disable or Change Notification Sound
You can change the notification sound if you don’t like the current one or silent the notifications altogether.
Start by pressing Win + I to launch the Settings app. Navigate to System > Notifications. Click on the tiny arrow to the right of the Notifications option and uncheck the box next to Allow notifications to play sounds to disable notification sounds.
You can also change the sound from Settings. Navigate to System > Sound and select More sound settings. Switch to the Sounds tab and select Notification from the Program Events list. Select a sound from the dropdown menu and select OK when you’re done.
If you like a very subtle, quick sound for notifications, this is how you can configure it.
6. Customize Notifications App-Wise
You can change the notification sound, behavior, and other variables for each app on your PC.
Start by pressing Win + I and navigate to System > Notifications. From here, you can enable or disable notifications, change the way notifications appear and their visibility on the lock screen, enable or disable notification sound for them, and change the priority.
This allows you to get finer control over notifications for each app you use on your PC.
7. Disable Lock Screen Notifications
You can enable or disable notifications from appearing on the lock screen.
Press Win + I to open the Settings app and navigate to System > Notifications. Uncheck the box next to Show notifications on the lock screen. You can also choose to disable the option to Show reminders and incoming VoIP calls on the lock screen.
You’ll no longer see notifications on your lock screen.
8. Disable Browser Notifications from Microsoft Edge
If you’ve enabled site alerts for specific websites or have extensions that trigger notifications, you can change that using Microsoft Edge (provided it’s the browser you use).
Launch Microsoft Edge and click on the ellipsis at the top-right. Select Settings and select Cookies and site permissions > Notifications.
Scroll to the bottom, click the ellipsis next to the site you want to block notifications from, and select Block.
Once you’ve done this, you won’t see notifications from the items you’ve blocked on the list. Of course, you can also disable notifications on other browsers.
Get More Control Over Notifications
Windows offers a ton of customizability when it comes to notifications. If you didn’t know about these tweaks already, you’ll now have a lot more control over how your PC delivers notifications from apps and the operating system to your screen.
However, if you liked the little speed balloon notifications in older versions of Windows, you can also bring those back to your Windows 10 or 11 system.
