Fix for iPhone not displaying text message notifications

You might be reading this thread because your iPhone no longer displays notifications of any kind when you get texts, which can be frustrating.

While it may be as simple as turning on the notifications by going to Settings -> Notifications -> Messages, you might have done this and still see no notifications.

I'm here to tell you a secret I haven't found anywhere else on the web, regarding why notifications many not be working.

The iPhone uses the system time to decide whether to notify you or not. Here's how it works....

1) When a text comes in, the iPhone assigns it the time on your system clock.

2) The notifications system has made note of when you last viewed text notifications

3) The notifications system is constantly checking for all texts which occurred after your last time reading your notifications. It will put all of these texts in the notifications queue to display.


This normally works fine, and the user doesn't have to think about how it works.

However, if you artificially set your system clock forward, and then set it back to normal, it will confuse the notification system!

For example, today's date is June 26, 2025. Let's say you set your clock to show the current date/time as 5:00am on August 7, 2025. You then receive some texts, which are all datestamped August 7th. You see the notifications for them.

Then you set your clock back to automatic time, and it reverts back to the correct date of June 26.

Unfortunately, at this point, the last notifications you received were on August 7, 2025, so your phone will believe you no longer have to be notified of any texts until after that date! Setting the clock back will not fix this.

So how do you fix this? It's easy.

0) Make sure the phone is set to the correct date and time. (That is, if you set it forward, put it back on automatic time setting.)

1) Go to your text messages. Delete ALL texts with dates in the future (ones which arrived when you set the clock forward).

2) Reboot the phone or turn it off/on

3) Text message yourself from a different number (or have a friend do it). Stay on the home screen while this happens.

4) Go to your texts and read the messages.


That should fix it. The next text messages you get will show notifications normally.

In case you are wondering why anyone would ever set their date forward, sometimes it is advantageous to do this in games or other apps which give you limited free usage per day. Setting the date forward can give you more immediate free usage without having to wait.