How to tame the barrage of stealthy social media notifications and regain control

If the number of emails, text messages and spam calls isn’t enough to deal with, suddenly you are inundated with an overwhelming number of notifications from your social media apps. At first, it seems exciting to be notified that people are showing interest in your profile or posts, but later, you realize that it was just a way to get you to open the app and engage with others.

While these notifications initially look personal or important, you may realize after clicking on a few of these alerts that they aren’t what they seem. Often they are simply notifying you of activity that other people in your social media “circle” may be up to on the platform and not necessarily about you or your actual post. Many social media companies are “pushing” these pseudo-relevant notifications in an attempt to get more engagement from their users.

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LinkedIn notifications (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Take back control: How to turn off notifications

If you’re tired of opening these notifications only to be distracted or disappointed, below are some ways to manage these potentially annoying notifications and put the power back in your hands.

Managing notifications on social media apps

If you want to adjust how often and what kind of notifications you receive from your social media apps, you can find the options in the app’s settings. Here are some examples of how to change notifications within the apps.

Facebook:

Managing Facebook notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing Facebook notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing Facebook notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing Facebook notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing Facebook notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Instagram:

Managing Instagram notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing Instagram notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing Instagram notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing Instagram notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

MORE: DON’T FALL FOR THIS SNEAKY NOTIFICATION THAT’S FOOLING PEOPLE ON FACEBOOK AND INSTAGRAM

LinkedIn:

Managing LinkedIn notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing LinkedIn notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Managing LinkedIn notification (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

X:

Snapchat:

MORE: TIPS TO FOLLOW FROM ONE INCREDIBLY COSTLY CONVERSATION WITH CYBERCROOKS

Managing notifications on your Device

These social media companies are finding new, creative ways to get you to open their app and interact with its content. If going app to app and different types of notifications are overwhelming, you can also choose to control notifications from your device.

On the iPhone:

You can either manage notifications or set boundaries on your phone using the “Focus” feature.

To manage notifications or specific app notifications:

Managing notifications on iPhone (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

Turn off allow notifications on iPhone (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

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To utilize the ‘Focus’ feature

How to use the “Focus” feature to customize your notifications and contacts on iPhone and Android.

iPhone:

To utilize the Focus feature on iPhone (Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson)

On an Android:

Settings may vary depending on your Android phone’s manufacturer.

Kurt’s key takeaways

You can’t control how social media apps will try to lure your attention away from your work and life and redirect it to their app. What you can control is whether they get your attention in the first place by controlling how and when you get notifications.

Are you willing to go app by app to adjust notification settings to your liking? Or will you control notifications directly from your device? Do you get a ton of notifications that you can’t even comb through? Let us know by writing us at Cyberguy.com/Contact.

For more of my tech tips & security alerts, subscribe to my free CyberGuy Report Newsletter by heading to Cyberguy.com/Newsletter.

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Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson is an award-winning tech journalist who has a deep love of technology, gear and gadgets that make life better with his contributions for Fox News & FOX Business beginning mornings on “FOX & Friends.” Got a tech question? Get Kurt’s CyberGuy Newsletter, share your voice, a story idea or comment at CyberGuy.com.