The H.A.C.K.E.R. Project

Our phones are incredibly useful tools, and many people rarely go anywhere without their phone. They help us to keep in touch with each other, stay up to date on the news and weather, and entertain us. However, when we are trying to focus, our phones can be a distraction. Each time our phone dings or chimes we may be tempted to check it, which can lead to us wasting time and getting distracted from the task at hand. Luckily, many phones come with a useful feature known as “Do Not Disturb” that can help us maintain our focus without having to silence or turn off our phones.

What is “Do Not Disturb”?

As the name implies, “Do Not Disturb” is a setting that can be enabled that can completely silence your phone. You will still receive your texts and notifications, but your phone will not make any sound. You may be wondering why someone would use Do Not Disturb mode over simply silencing their phone or turning it off altogether. Unlike silencing your phone- which simply makes it so no notifications will make sound- Do Not Disturb is, on the vast majority of devices, customizable.

When you enable Do Not Disturb, you can usually customize which notifications are still allowed to make a notification sound on your phone. In the settings menu for Do Not Disturb, you can choose whether or not messages or phone calls from certain people will still make noise on your phone, whether you will hear a notification sound from certain apps, or whether or not any alarms you set will still audibly ring. For example, say I have five contacts in my phone: Alex, Bob, Cassandra, Doug, and Emily. Let’s say I want to turn on Do Not Disturb so I can focus on my work, but I also need to be able to answer the phone if Doug calls or texts me. I can set Doug as a priority or starred contact and then set Do Not Disturb to still allow notifications from priority or starred contacts. That way, if Bob or Emily calls while I am working, my phone will remain silent, but if Doug calls me, my phone will still ring. Similarly, if I have three apps on my phone, and one of them is for work, I can give that app permission to interrupt Do Not Disturb so that I can still be notified.

Another way that Do Not Disturb can be used is for when you are sleeping. That way, only certain people can reach you while you are asleep in the event of an emergency. You can customize Do Not Disturb as mentioned above to allow certain contacts to be able to still make a notification sound or ringtone if they text or call. On some devices, you can make it so that if someone calls you twice within a short period of time, the second call will ring your phone and make noise.

How Do I Enable Do Not Disturb?

Generally, to turn on Do Not Disturb, you must find the Do Not Disturb menu within your phone’s settings app. This is usually under the Sound or Notification menu. If your Settings app has a search function, you can try searching for Do Not Disturb and the option should appear. Alternatively, your phone may have the Do Not Disturb option as part of the menu that appears when you swipe down or up on the home screen of your device. As a note, if you have an older model phone, some features of Do Not Disturb may not be available.

Finally, you can manually turn on or off Do Not Disturb at any point, but, on many devices, you can also set a Do Not Disturb schedule. That way, you do not have to worry about forgetting to turn on or off Do Not Disturb since your phone will do it automatically for you. On many phones, you can set multiple schedules or even have Do Not Disturb automatically turn on during any event scheduled in your phone’s calendar. By setting these schedules, you will no longer have to worry about being interrupted during important moments again.