All the Ways You Can Customize Notifications on Android Auto

If you're an Android Auto user, you may already know that setting up phone notifications while you're driving isn't as straightforward as it could be—though Google has recently made a settings tweak that should simplify things. On the one hand, you don't want to miss important messages or calls, but on the other you definitely don't want to put yourself and other road users at risk by getting distracted while driving. A careful balance is needed, and it's important to know what options are available on your phone.

If you're a Pixel user, Do Not Disturb is handled by Modes, which you can find by tapping Modes in Settings. Pick Driving, and if you enable the While driving toggle switch, this mode is automatically enabled when you're in your car.

You can mute some or all of your phone's notifications when driving. Credit: Lifehacker

Tap the While driving text (not the toggle switch), and you can tell Android how it should determine whether or not you're driving. This is the setting that Google recently tweaked: You can now choose Use Bluetooth (so the mode is enabled when a car dashboard is detected), or Use motion and Bluetooth (which also takes readings from your phone's accelerometer into consideration). Previously, you had to rely solely on motion, which led to problems with automatic activation for both drivers and passengers—the addition of Bluetooth should mean a more reliable experience.

It's slightly different on Samsung Galaxy phones: You need to tap Modes and Routines from Settings, then you can access the Driving mode. Here, you can specifically set a connection to an Android Auto dashboard as the trigger for enabling the mode, rather than just any Bluetooth device—something Google should really add to standard Android.

On both Pixel and Galaxy phones, you can tweak the driving mode to allow notifications from certain apps or from certain people, but again be wary of making your vehicle too distracting with pop-ups and pings.

Other Android Auto notification settings

As well as setting which apps and contacts can trigger phone notifications while you're driving, you can customize these modes further. From the Driving mode screen on a Pixel, tap Display settings to control whether or not the phone lights up when you get a notification. You can also dim the wallpaper, and switch to a grayscale look.

When you're editing your Driving mode on a Galaxy phone, you'll see you can tap either Lock screen or Home screen to change the wallpaper and color palette specifically for this mode. Again, the idea is that your phone is a little less distracting visually.

There are more notification options on the main Android Auto settings page: From Android Settings, tap Connected devices > Connection preferences > Android Auto (Pixel) or Connected devices > Android Auto (Galaxy).

Under the Messaging header, you can turn off alerts for group conversations, or for messaging apps entirely. There's also a toggle switch here for showing or hiding the first line of the incoming message—you probably want to disable this if you want to spend more time with your eyes on the road.

You can control how messages appear on your dashboard. Credit: Lifehacker

Finally, there's the option for having your incoming messages read out loud to you, which is another way you can reduce the temptation to stare at your vehicle's dashboard for an extended period of time, or to pick up and unlock your phone.

It's worth reviewing all the other Android Auto settings here as well, to make sure your driving experience is set up exactly the way you want: You can reduce the number of apps available in Android Auto, for example, and enable taskbar widgets for easier app control, which can also make a difference to how distracted you are on the road.

You should end up with an Android Auto notification system that's not going to overwhelm you with alerts while you're driving, but which also won't hide important messages from you by automatically enabling notification filters without you being aware.

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