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Kaladin

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 30, 2021
12
6
Hello, I wonder if anyone is experiencing this same issue with low volume notifications with all volumes turned up to max. I have ringer and alerts turned up all the way in settings, and still, my notifications come out very low - Ringtone is loud, no issue with the ringtones - It's just the stock notification alerts. Anyone else experiencing this on the 13 series? It's really annoying because it's like half the volume of the ringer tone and sometimes hard to hear. Check it out yourselves, guys, and see if you have this issue as well.

For the record, I have Attention Aware Features turned off, and It didn't help.
 

Malyki

macrumors newbie
Sep 20, 2021
6
3
You aren’t the only one. Just switched from a note 20 ultra and I haven’t had a iPhone in 10 years so I thought it was all in my head. I grabbed my buddies 12 pro and it’s the same thing. Having issues hearing damn notifications. I think the stock notifications are low the others doesn’t seem to have this issue.
 

Kaladin

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 30, 2021
12
6
You aren’t the only one. Just switched from a note 20 ultra and I haven’t had a iPhone in 10 years so I thought it was all in my head. I grabbed my buddies 12 pro and it’s the same thing. Having issues hearing damn notifications. I think the stock notifications are low the others doesn’t seem to have this issue.
Sadly, for me, it's not just stock text tones, but all of them. I even tried adding one manually that I made, and it still sounded half the volume of the ringtone even when the volume is at max. I'm getting frustrated at this point, and I just want to see if anyone else is having the same issues I'm having with this phone or if it's an isolated issue.
 

Tokenfreak

macrumors 6502a
Oct 31, 2011
634
360
I’m having the same issue. Some of my notifications seem to make no sound whatsoever if they do I can’t hear them. Hopefully apple fixes this soon as it is very annoying.
 

macintoshmac

Suspended
May 13, 2010
6,089
6,992
I am surprised this has carried over from 12 to 13. Coming from an 8, I am not happy that for the same level on the slider, notifications on the 8 sound louder than on the 12 mini.
 

Kaladin

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 30, 2021
12
6
I am surprised this has carried over from 12 to 13. Coming from an 8, I am not happy that for the same level on the slider, notifications on the 8 sound louder than on the 12 mini.
Tell me about it... I actually thought there was something wrong with my phone. I went to the Apple Store, and then they told me that this was normal. And they actually showed me another iPhone and compared it with mine, and Its notification sounds were also low. So this issue is directly from Apple and not our devices.
 
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Reactions: macintoshmac

macintoshmac

Suspended
May 13, 2010
6,089
6,992
Tell me about it... I actually thought there was something wrong with my phone. I went to the Apple Store, and then they told me that this was normal. And they actually showed me another iPhone and compared it with mine, and Its notification sounds were also low. So this issue is directly from Apple and not our devices.

This is truly the first ever this has happened with me.

4S --> 5, no issues.
5 --> 5s, no issues.
5s --> 7, no issues.
7 --> 8, no issues.

8 --> 12 mini, low notification volume. :rolleyes:

Speaker quality is great, though. I like that the 12 mini speakers are more balanced than the 8, which was noticeably right-heavy when used in landscape mode to watch videos. The 12 mini is vastly improved in that regard.
 

Kaladin

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 30, 2021
12
6
This is truly the first ever this has happened with me.

4S --> 5, no issues.
5 --> 5s, no issues.
5s --> 7, no issues.
7 --> 8, no issues.

8 --> 12 mini, low notification volume. :rolleyes:

Speaker quality is great, though. I like that the 12 mini speakers are more balanced than the 8, which was noticeably right-heavy when used in landscape mode to watch videos. The 12 mini is vastly improved in that regard.
Yeah, the speakers are great, but the issue is how low the notification sounds are and how we're unable to increase the volume for them. It's quite ridiculous, I guess people that are hard of hearing are just completely ignored by Apple.
 
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cc999

macrumors 6502
Jul 15, 2008
477
190
Yeah, the speakers are great, but the issue is how low the notification sounds are and how we're unable to increase the volume for them. It's quite ridiculous, I guess people that are hard of hearing are just completely ignored by Apple.
I installed LOUD ringtones I got from a google search and its loud as hell

CC
 

Kaladin

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 30, 2021
12
6
I installed LOUD ringtones I got from a google search and its loud as hell

CC
I'm talking about notification sounds here and not ringtones. Please read my topic properly.
 

Kaladin

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 30, 2021
12
6
Here you go, I have these and my messages notification sound is loud:


CC
It has nothing to do with the notification sounds themselves. It's just that Apple lowers the notification sounds by design. Notification sounds are literally half the loudness of ringtones on the new iPhones. If you have an old iPhone, then you won't know what I'm talking about.
 

smorrissey

macrumors 68000
Mar 12, 2015
1,586
790
Have you guys tried a clean ios 15.1 installation? i was thinking about doing that...but don't know it will be worth it.
 

Kaladin

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 30, 2021
12
6
Have you guys tried a clean ios 15.1 installation? i was thinking about doing that...but don't know it will be worth it.
Yes, I did a hard reset, but it didn't change anything. This issue is from Apple and not from the device. They did this intentionally, I went to an Apple Store and talked to the employee there, and he told me Apple did this and it's intended this way, sadly. The only way to fix this is to hope Apple changes this down the line.
 

smorrissey

macrumors 68000
Mar 12, 2015
1,586
790
Yes, I did a hard reset, but it didn't change anything. This issue is from Apple and not from the device. They did this intentionally, I went to an Apple Store and talked to the employee there, and he told me Apple did this and it's intended this way, sadly. The only way to fix this is to hope Apple changes this down the line.

I've read in the Apple forums the possible "intention" for doing this....to buy an Apple Watch too lol.
 
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Vegas33139

macrumors regular
Nov 30, 2014
110
56
Muffsville, Jannerbama
Frustrating, isn't it?

As above, music playback is nice and loud. The speaker quality is very good. As for notification volume levels it's really poor. Ok, I get loud ringtones or notifications aren't for everyone, but I work outside, and even with vibrate on, I miss a lot of message and emails through not hearing the notifications. Surely it's just a software bump from Apple to increase the notification and ringer volumes!
 

Filly

macrumors newbie
Jan 18, 2005
7
0
Have you guys tried a clean ios 15.1 installation? i was thinking about doing that...but don't know it will be worth it.
Hello, I wonder if anyone is experiencing this same issue with low volume notifications with all volumes turned up to max. I have ringer and alerts turned up all the way in settings, and still, my notifications come out very low - Ringtone is loud, no issue with the ringtones - It's just the stock notification alerts. Anyone else experiencing this on the 13 series? It's really annoying because it's like half the volume of the ringer tone and sometimes hard to hear. Check it out yourselves, guys, and see if you have this issue as well.

For the record, I have Attention Aware Features turned off, and It didn't help.
Yes. My husband had identical problem. Fixed by cleaning out speaker port. Suggest going to Apple store and have them do it. Edited to add…His fix only lasted a day. Took to Apple, they said it was due to the latest update. It is fixed for now.
 
Last edited:
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