Custom Notifications – Instructions

Custom Notifications is a Samsung smartwatch application that allows the users to change the built-in notifications sound with a custom sound from their device.

Compatible with: Samsung Gear S3, Samsung Galaxy Watch, Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2, Samsung Galaxy Watch 3.

Download link: https://galaxystore.samsung.com/geardetail/Yuz8U0RiHA

Youtube DEMO video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Flwm3NDpKU

ATTENTION: The application does not allow customizing each individual notification with different custom sounds. You cannot have for example a custom sound for WhatsApp notifications and another for Facebook notifications. You can only have one custom sound for all. I am aware that many users wish to assign different sounds to different apps, but this is currently impossible to implement by third-party developers.

This is a step-by-step tutorial on how to use it:

• Install the application from the Samsung App Store.
• Search on the internet for a sound that you want to set for notifications. For example, on this website. The sound file is recommended to be in .mp3 or .ogg format.
• Transfer the audio file obtained from the previous steps to your smartphone, and then, using the Galaxy Wearable application, to your smartwatch. Open it up, select Add content to your watch, then Add tracks, and select the audio file.

• After uploading the audio file to your smartwatch, open the Custom Notifications application, click on the Select sound button and select it from the list. Its title color will change to yellow, meaning that it’s the actual sound used for notifications. The first time you use the application you will be asked to allow storage permissions. Please enable them, otherwise, the application will not have access to your audio files.
• Turn off the volume for the built-in notifications. To do this, go to the volume control page of the smartwatch, by swiping down on the screen and selecting the volume icon from the shortcuts list. After that, swipe right until you see the notifications volume. Turn it to 0. Also, make sure that the ringtone volume is turned on (at least at 1).

• Select Handbell, Musicbox, or Flicker for the built-in notifications sound from the smartwatch’s settings.
• Enable the application from the Settings page of the app, and don’t forget to re-enable it each time you restart the smartwatch or put it into power-saving mode. In these situations, it will be killed by the system and it cannot auto-restart. If your smartwatch’s Tizen version is lower than 5, you’ll need to allow the storage permission again.
• You can control the volume for the custom notifications from the Settings page of the app.
• In order to hear the notifications, the smartwatch should NOT be on Do not disturb mode, Power-saving mode, Goodnight mode, Theater mode, Vibrations only, or Muted.
• If you didn’t allow the storage permission during the app setup and you also checked the Don’t repeat checkbox, you’ll have to allow the permission from the smartwatch settings->Apps->Permissions. From there, search for this application in the list and enable the storage permission. Even if the storage permission appears to be allowed, I recommend you to uncheck it and check it back again (this is to avoid a known bug of the Tizen system).

Widget

To make it easier to enable/disable the application, you can use the widget that the app comes with. Simply go to add a new widget on your smartwatch and select the Custom Notifications Widget from the list.

Current limitations

The default alarm app of the smartwatch uses the notifications volume. If you turn off the volume for the notifications (a requirement for this app), you’ll not be able to hear the alarms. The solution is to either enable the notifications volume just before going to sleep or to use a custom alarm application, that does not use the notifications audio channel, such as our Alarm with custom ringtones.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. I can hear both the custom notification sound and the built-in one. How do I fix this?
   • You just have to turn off the volume for the built-in notifications, like in the images attached above.
2. I can hear the custom notification sound twice per notification. How do I fix this?
   • The notification sound you selected is too short, so it has enough time to play again once it finishes. You should select custom sounds that are at least 2-3 seconds in length. They don’t have to make a sound for the entire duration, they can make a sound for 1 second and the rest be silent. If you have a notification sound with a short length and it triggers twice, I suggest extending it with 2-3 additional silent seconds, using audio editing software.
3. I followed the instructions precisely, but the custom notifications sound is not working. What should I do?
   • Try to restart the smartwatch and re-enable the application. If the problem persists, please contact me.
     

If you have problems setting up this application, please contact me using this form.