When we receive a notification in most cases we proceed directly to reading it and, if necessary, we also open the associated app to reply to the message or to deepen the content inside. It can happen to close an important notification by mistake: in this case knowing how to read past notifications in Android will be very useful, therefore being able to count on a real history of notifications on the phone.
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In the guide that follows we will show you how to view notification history on Android taking advantage of both the function provided on modern Android releases and the apps that allow you to keep track of notifications on phones without this feature.
Notification history built into Android
On devices with Android 11 or later we can quickly access the notification history built into the operating system, without having to install any app. To proceed we must first activate the notification history by opening the app Settings by tapping on the menu Apps and notifications by selecting the menu Notifications and finally pressing on the menu Notification history.
Within the menu, we press at the top on Use the notification history to activate the function. From now on, all notifications we receive on the phone will be stored in this menu, including those we close or postpone for later reading.
This history is excellent for always keeping an eye on the notifications that we close from the dedicated screen, so as to be sure not to lose even one. Unfortunately, this interesting function must be activated manually and only after activation will it begin to remember past notifications.
App to get notification history
Many custom Android operating systems have no notification history, even if they adopt Android 11 as the basis for the operating system; to them are added the many phones with Android 10 or earlier versions still active and working.
To remedy this shortcoming on custom phones or old phones we can install the app Notification History available for download from Google Play Store.
By installing this app we can get a complete history of all notifications arrived on the phone and also benefit from other very interesting functions such as the filtering system by type of app or by date and time, the system for blocking system notifications or notifications. duplicate and an automatic cleaner to delete notifications stored for more than 3 months (to save space).
Another very powerful app that we can use to see all past notifications on Android is Spren Notification Manager downloadable for free from Google Play Store.
This app allows you to view the history of notifications received on your smartphone and supports us with a universal notification search system, a system for automatically postponing less important notifications and a notification backup and restore system and a menu dedicated to customizing the appearance. of the individual notifications.
Another app capable of introducing notification history on Android is FilterBox can be installed directly from Google Play Store.
By relying on FilterBox for the purpose we will get a complete notification history of the last 30 days, a timeline mode to view notifications in chronological order on a timeline, a filtering system for important notifications (or less important notifications), a analysis system of the notifications received (with indications on the app that shows more notifications) and 4 themes of your choice with integrated Dark Mode.
Conclusions
Google has introduced the notification history on the new versions of Android (precisely from version 11), which is really good for checking later the notifications we have received during the day and which we have deleted by mistake or silenced at the least appropriate moment. Unfortunately, the fragmentation of Android leads many systems based on it not to have the history at the system level (as for example on Xiaomi phones), thus forcing you to choose one of the alternative apps.
Alternative apps are good but however, they expose users to reading all notifications from external apps Not a wise choice if we often receive notification messages with activation codes or authentication codes. Those who use these apps must be good at deactivating the history of SMS notifications (the messages are present in the dedicated app) and the history of authentication app or banking apps.
Still on the subject of notifications, we invite you to read our guides on how turn off notifications from sites in Chrome, Firefox, Edge, and Safari and how have all Android notifications visible on your PC in real-time.
