Android Q Beta 3: Notifications get a new UI for quickly changing priority, can no longer be snoozed

Ben Schoon | May 8 2019 - 6:01 am PT

With every new Android release, there’s a list of things Google always seems to mess around with. In the third Android Q Beta, one of those is notifications, and it’s a mixed bag of gains and loss.

It’s easier to change notification priority…

The good here. In the latest Android Q Beta, Google has implemented a new UI for changing the priority of a notification. The new UI offers a quick toggle when you swipe to the left which can switch the notification between “Interruptive” and “Gentle.”

By default, most notifications are set to “Interruptive,” and that means they can trigger the ringtone, show in your notification list, status bar, and lock screen. Basically, it’s the usual behavior we’re all used to. “Gentle,” on the other hand, makes notifications silent. They won’t make sound, appear on the lockscreen, or pop-up over your display. They will still be in the notification list, though.

It’s nice to have these toggles so easy to get to, and the simple descriptions ought to help users understand what exactly they do.

Android Q Beta 3 (left) vs Android Q Beta 1 (right – swipe left & long-press)

…But the ability to snooze notifications is gone

However, this new UI surely isn’t worth what was lost. In Android Q Beta 3, Google ditches the ability to snooze notifications. That’s a serious shame, as the underused functionality was very useful. Speaking from my own experience, I barely used this feature at all, but clearly this change is already irritating some users over on Reddit.

From what we can tell, there’s simply no way to snooze notifications on the latest version of Android Q. The icon for snoozing the notification does still briefly appear when you swipe, but the new UI for priority immediately overtakes it. For the time being, snoozing is gone, but we can hope that it will return in a future update.