New Owner - 'Mute Phone while Connected' & notification questions

[project.in.process]

Love the watch -- fantastic display. Had it ~12 hours and already like it more than my Moto360 (EXCEPT that this watch won't prompt me for the Google sign-in verification: "are you trying to sign in?" --> that will be greatly missed)

Questions:
1. On Android Wear, I had an option "Mute Phone while connected" -- in essence, it muted any notification sounds on the phone while my Moto360 was connected.
However, with the GearS3, the phone & watch both emit a notification sound. The only work-around I've found is to put the phone on 'Do Not Disturb', which still allows the Watch to emit notification sounds.
Is there any other way to accomplish this?

2. Notification delay on the watch is 'noticeable'. It looks like a notification will only appear on the watch if i lift my hand. I do have 'Always On Display: ON', so the screen is dim most of the time.
It's not a deal breaker, but an inconvenience if notifications aren't coming thru promptly when received on the phone.

 

[afblangley]

2. Notification delay on the watch is 'noticeable'. It looks like a notification will only appear on the watch if i lift my hand. I do have 'Always On Display: ON', so the screen is dim most of the time.
It's not a deal breaker, but an inconvenience if notifications aren't coming thru promptly when received on the phone.

There should be no delay in notifications. I receive them across my phone, tablet and watch simultaneously. In the Gear Manager app, SETTINGS -> NOTIFICATIONS, make sure you've selected show while using phone. Also, notifications can be set to turn on the screen when they arrive. It can also be set to show an yellow indicator light on the watchface.

 

[Redflea]

There is no direct way to mute the phone while the watch is connected, something I wanted as well.

You can do this via Tasker (and I expect a simpler tool like MacroDroid could help you accomplish the same thing).

Frankly, I'd start w/MacroDroid (unless you're more of a techie) and put together a macro that mutes your phone based on BT connection status of your watch to your phone. You'd have one macro that mutes phone when watch is connected, and a second that sets volume back to normal when it disconnects.

In Tasker you'd create a Profile that is linked to your watch connection status, and create two Tasks (mute phone/restore phone volume) and make those the entry/exit tasks for the profile.

Tasker is not nearly as easy to use as Macrodroid, and Macrodroid can do many of the things Tasker can, so I'd suggest you try that first.

Now that I have this set up in Tasker it works perfectly - when my watch is connected to my phone via BT it is muted, when it disconnects the phone volume is restored.

What I really want is a way to control volumne on my watch based on location or time of day (so it can be softer/vibration only at work), but haven't found a way to do that yet, unfortunately.