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How to fix Galaxy S9 Plus not showing notifications for text messages issue

This post will show you how to fix notification-related issue on the Galaxy S9 Plus. If your own Galaxy S9 Plus has a problem with notifications, any of the solutions below should help.

Problem: Galaxy S9 Plus not showing notifications for text messages

Hi!  I have not been receiving notifications for text messaging for several weeks now.  My text message icon used to show a number to indicate how many new text messages I received; and I also would hear a notification sound.  Neither of those happen anymore, so I now have to constantly open my text messages to see what new ones I’ve received. My do not disturb is not on and my sound is “on” for text messages.  I did notice that the bell icon on each text message had a line drawn through it to indicate the sound is off, but in my settings, the sound is ON. When I manually went into the settings for an individual text message, the sound notification is turned off.  So I went through the individual settings for all my text messages one by one and turned it back on, but that didn’t work either. There is still no sound notification when a new text comes in (but the sound notification is working for all my other apps) and the message icon on my home page still doesn’t tell me when a new message comes in.  I noticed that my OS updated to Oreo on December 16th, and I’m wondering if that is what caused this to happen as I never went into any of my settings to change anything. And I think the notifications stopped happening around the December 16th timeframe. Any idea how to fix this?

Solution: This problem does not have a straightforward solution. The main thing that you want to do in this case is to find out where the exact problem lies. Follow the steps below on how to do that.

Forced restart

Before changing settings and going deep into troubleshooting details, you want to make sure that the system is refreshed. You can do that by simulating the effects of “battery pull” to clear any temporary bug that may be causing the problem. Here’s how to do that:

  1. Press and hold the Power + Volume Down buttons for approximately 10 seconds or until the device power cycles. Allow several seconds for the Maintenance Boot Mode screen to appear.
  2. From the Maintenance Boot Mode screen, select Normal Boot. You can use the volume buttons to cycle through the available options and the lower left button (below the volume buttons) to select. Wait for up to 90 seconds for the reset to complete.

Force quit messaging app

The next simple solution is to ensure that you restart the app having the issue itself. What you want to do is force quit the messaging app and other apps. This sometimes work in fixing minor bugs. Simply tap on the Recent Apps button, the button on the left of the Bixby key. Then, once the list of apps are shown, simply tap on CLOSE ALL button at the bottom.

Set up notification settings

Obviously, you also want to make sure that your messaging app notification settings are set up properly. Follow our help below on how to do this.

  1. Open Settings app.
  2. Tap Apps.
  3. Tap on More settings (three dots) at the upper right.
  4. Tap Show system apps.
  5. Find the messaging app you’re using and tap it.
  6. Tap Notifications.
  7. Ensure that Notifications is turned ON.
  8. Ensure that App icon badges is set to ON.
  9. Ensure that numbers or contacts you want to get notifications from are turned ON.
  10. Scroll to the bottom and tap on More settings in app.
  11. Tap Notifications.
  12. Ensure that Other notifications is ON.
  13. Under Advanced section, set up App icon badges, On lock screen, and Do not disturb custom exception are set up to your preference. Enabling App icon badges option means that you’ll get the numbers of unread messages on the Messaging app to show. We think this is what you’re missing.
  14. After doing all the steps above, restart the device and see if everything is working as far as notifications are concerned.

Clear cache partition

Should nothing change after setting up the notifications as instructed above, the next good thing to do is to clear the cache partition. Sometimes, a corrupted system cache can cause all sorts of problems. To minimize problems from a corrupted system cache, make sure to clear the cache partition with these steps:

  1. Turn off the device.
  2. Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
  3. When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
  4. Press the Volume down key several times to highlight ‘wipe cache partition’.
  5. Press Power button to select.
  6. Press the Volume down key until ‘yes’ is highlighted and press the Power button.
  7. When the wipe cache partition is complete, “Reboot system now” is highlighted.
  8. Press the Power key to restart the device.

Delete app cache

In case there’s a problem with the messaging app cache, the next step for you is to clear the messaging app’s cache. Here’s how it’s done:

  1. From the Home screen, swipe up on an empty spot to open the Apps tray.
  2. Tap Settings.
  3. Tap Apps.
  4. Tap the 3 dots icon (at the upper right)
  5. Tap Show system apps to display preinstalled apps.
  6. Find and tap appropriate app.
  7. Tap Storage.
  8. Tap Clear cache.
  9. Tap OK.
  10. Restart the device and check for the problem.

Revert messaging app to defaults

Following the clearing of app cache procedure is making clearing its data. You must do this if the problem remains after clearing the cache. Deleting the messaging app’s data will result to the loss of your texts so be sure to back them up ahead of time. By doing this troubleshooting step, you are effectively reverting the app to its defaults. Here’s how it’s done:

  1. From the Home screen, swipe up on an empty spot to open the Apps tray.
  2. Tap Settings.
  3. Tap Apps.
  4. Tap the 3 dots icon (at the upper right)
  5. Tap Show system apps to display preinstalled apps.
  6. Find and tap appropriate app.
  7. Tap Storage.
  8. Tap Clear data.
  9. Tap OK.
  10. Restart the device and check for the problem.

Reset app preferences

Resetting app preferences is oftentimes overlooked in many Android troubleshooting articles but when it comes to an issue like yours, it might help a lot. It’s possible that one or some of your default apps may not be set correctly, causing this glitch to occur. Because there’s no way to know if this guess is true, what you need to do is to simply ensure that all default apps are turned on. Here’s how to do that:

  1. Open Settings app.
  2. Tap Apps.
  3. Tap on More settings at the upper right (three-dot icon).
  4. Select Reset app preferences.
  5. Restart your S9 and check for the problem.

Reset network settings

This is an expected troubleshooting step for any networking issue. There may be a configuration error on your device. To clear it or any other potential network bugs, try to do the steps below.

  1. From the Home screen, swipe up on an empty spot to open the Apps tray.
  2. Tap General Management > Reset settings.
  3. Tap Reset network settings.
  4. If you have set up a PIN, enter it.
  5. Tap Reset settings. Once complete a confirmation window will appear.

Safe Mode

At times, an app may interfere with Android and result to problems. To check if you’ve installed a bad app, try to boot the phone to safe mode. These are the steps on how to restart the device to safe mode:

  1. Turn the device off.
  2. Press and hold the Power key past the model name screen.
  3. When “SAMSUNG” appears on the screen, release the Power key.
  4. Immediately after releasing the Power key, press and hold the Volume down key.
  5. Continue to hold the Volume down key until the device finishes restarting.
  6. Safe mode will display in the bottom left corner of the screen.
  7. Release the Volume down key when you see Safe Mode.
  8. Check if notifications starts working normally again.

If the problem is absent on safe mode, try to restart back to normal mode (by restarting the device again) and see if the problem returns. If it does, then that means an app is behind this trouble. To identify which of your apps is causing the trouble, you should boot the phone back to safe mode and follow these steps:

  1. Boot to safe mode.
  2. Check for the problem.
  3. Once you’ve confirmed that a third party app is to blame, you can start uninstalling apps individually. We suggest that you begin with the most recent ones you added.
  4. After you uninstall an app, restart the phone to normal mode and check for the problem.
  5. If your S9+ is still problematic, repeat steps 1-4.

Delete data of BadgeProvider app

Notification-related issues can sometimes be caused by a bug in BadgeProvider app. This is an app, in general, that manages notifications for the system and apps. To ensure that it stays good, make sure that you reset it to its factory state. Here’s how:

  1. Open Settings app.
  2. Tap Apps.
  3. Tap on More settings at the upper right (three-dot icon).
  4. Select Show system apps.
  5. Find and tap your app.
  6. Tap Storage.
  7. Tap Clear Data button.
  8. Restart your S9 and check for the problem.

Factory reset

If the cause of the problem is software-related, wiping the device with factory reset might help. Learn how to factory reset your S9 by doing these steps:

  1. Create a backup of your data.
  2. Turn off the device.
  3. Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
  4. When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
  5. Press the Volume down key several times to highlight ‘wipe data / factory reset’.
  6. Press Power button to select.
  7. Press the Volume down key until ‘Yes — delete all user data’ is highlighted.
  8. Press Power button to select and start the master reset.
  9. When the master reset is complete, ‘Reboot system now’ is highlighted.
  10. Press the Power key to restart the device.

 


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