Why don't calendar alarms work?

[AC Question]

I am continuously buying and returning phones because I always find calendar alarm failures. I use the calendar reminders as alarms and sometimes they trigger a notification and sometimes don't. I have found the same issue in these models until now:
- Asus Zenfone Max (Android 6)
- Asus Zenfone 3 Zoom (Android 6)
- Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge (Android 7)
- Samsung Galaxy S8+ (Android 7)
I have contact Samsung, and Asus, and I have tried to contact Google without success. I don't know what can I do for buying a phone when a simple thing such as a calendar alarm works always. This is really driving me nuts and I can't find any help. No one knows about the failure although I see and check that it is there.

 

[Golfdriver97]

I have a Pixel on 7.1.2. My calendar reminders sound off correctly. As for the suggestion of the app not being suitable for a specific OS level; the OS can read backwards for apps, so they can work, but the said app may not work very well.

 

[maykelbembibre]

Sorry if i'm missing something, but this is the first time I saw anything about a wrist clock. Are you talking about a smartwatch? What do you mean by disabling the automatic time?

The failure is easily reproduced by waiting for the phone to sound, turn on the screen, or whatever it does to show the notification of the calendar. For you to be able to wait until that time you need to know what time is it, but you can't turn on the phone's screen because that is not a correct step for reproducing the failure. So you need another clock, not a smartwatch, but a normal clock. Any clock that has exactly the same time as the phone. I wear a normal wrist clock and use it for this purpose. But in the phone you have to disable the automatic time, because it can affect the synchronization of the clocks.

Then, when your wrist clock says that the time of the notification has passed away, you have reproduced the failure.

 

[maykelbembibre]

Still I don't know if the failure was corrected at versions newer than the 7.0. I have never had a phone with newer versions for enough time to be able to test this problem.

 

[B. Diddy]

But in the phone you have to disable the automatic time, because it can affect the synchronization of the clocks.

I don't understand this part. Are you referring to the Automatic Network Time/Date option in Settings>Time & Date menu? Why would this affect synchronization with an analog watch that has no connection at all with the phone?

I doubt that turning off Automatic Network Time would be the cause of your problem, but just to be sure, leave it on and see if you can still reproduce the problem.

 

[maykelbembibre]

I don't understand this part. Are you referring to the Automatic Network Time/Date option in Settings>Time & Date menu? Why would this affect synchronization with an analog watch that has no connection at all with the phone?

I doubt that turning off Automatic Network Time would be the cause of your problem, but just to be sure, leave it on and see if you can still reproduce the problem.

I don't think that turning off automatic time causes problems.

And for the first question, yes I am. The way for reproducing the failure means that you have to look at your phone without turning the screen on and wait until it is time for the alert to be shown. How do you know if it is the time of the alert without turning on the screen? You need another independent clock which has got the same hour as your phone. But if you left on the automatic time then the time of the phone would change depending on the network, and then the phone and the other clock wouldn't show the same hour. You need to be sure that the phone and the other clock are always at the same hour. Then if the other clock shows that the hour of the alert has passed away and the phone does nothing, you know that the phone has failed.

 

[elisheva60]

I'm having the same issue of calendar notifications not making a sound!! I never had any problems with this up to the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge. My Galaxy Note 8 worked fine for a few months and now the calendar alarms DON'T sound! I have version 7.1.1.

 

[DanR2]

Same problem. Calendar never goes off.
Samsung SM-J120W Marshmallow. No 3rd party apps, everything native apps.
I don't see the issue is about the problem being 'rare'. The issue lies in being in a landfill of other idiosyncratic problems that likewise never get addressed, and sometimes not even answered at all; because each one doesn't have enough volume on its own to reach the ears of Google execs.

Somebody posts something and it just sits there for years. This just happens to not be one of those; but it's not new, and no answer systematically works.
Alphabet is putting its resources into being a Cambridge Analytics wannabe, not putting programmers on bugs and zero-days.

 

[a1291762]

I have a Sony Z3C runming Marshmallow. All was more or less good until I changed jobs. Now, my phone deep sleeps and I regularly miss my "go home" calendar event. My old job had spotty coverage which made a difference. Previously the battery drained slowly during the day. Now it does not drain unless I use it.

Battery optimization is off. Calendar is Etar but Nudnik does the alerting.

This is so unbelievably frustrating.

I have no issue in the morning but I use an alarm clock app to get up. Maybe alarm clocks are treated differently to calendars?

My own app that reminds me to get off the train also has suffered from this. It uses the timed notification api.

 

[methodman89]

You now mention a watch. Type? On the Gear is a setting that is user adjustable for how the alarm notification comes through if wearing the watch.
No screenshots? Only trust Chinese brands? Me smell troll. Or someone who thinks that they know what they are doing, but have come here to debate.
Either put up scteenshots of how you are doing things, or drop it. Have a good day.

 

[Kai L]

I have had the same issue for years, that sometimes the notifications don't show. I have many repeating events (once every day, on specific days, several times per day on weekdays and so on) to organize my life, but sometimes they don't show up.

I'm not sure about this but I think the problem happens especially often when the events overlap with each other / when the notifications happen roughly at the same time (within half an hour)


Moto G5 Android 8.1

 

[gf1701]

Same problem here. It's intermittent: sometimes alarms work, other times they don't. I'm on Android 8. At first, I thought the stock Calendar app was merely buggy, so I installed one called DigiCal from Google Play, but after successfully reminding me for the first couple of events I added to the calendar, it failed to alarm for the next one, and intermittently since then. It just happened again, so I thought maybe my phone (Moto Z) is the problem. I searched the web for other reports of this behavior, and found this thread. Apparently it's not limited to a single model of phone.

I stuck to using written reminders until about three months ago, when I started using the stock calendar, so I can live with these failures. But it nevertheless sucks that some of us are limited in this respect. And I'm not surprised at the many expressions of doubt that this is a true defect instead of a user error. ('It works for me, so you must be screwing up somewhere!')

 

[Paige Sergent]

I've had same issue with Galaxy J7 Prime & Galaxy J7 Star. Sometimes it works, but rarely. I have NO SOUND from alarm, either, yet both worked when I got new phone a couple weeks ago (J7 Star)
I am using alarm that was in the phone when I purchased it, too. I've resorted to a small, battery operated alarm clock for awakening & appointments. It's very annoying!

 

[pn3umatic]

Bought my first smartphone, a Nokia 4.2 (Android One v9). Google Calendar notifications are quite buggy. Sometimes it gives me a sound alert only, other times sound + wakes the screen, other times nothing at all. Not once has it ever illuminated my notification light. Notifications work just fine for missed calls, SMS texts and emails.

Currently going through Nokia customer service, but I doubt they can do anything.

 

[Rukbat]

Google Calendar isn't really supposed to be used for alarms. A date can be interpreted as 00:00:00 on that date, it can be interpreted as 23:59:59 on that date - unless you set the time understanding what you're doing, and not traveling between timezones, it may work. Apps like Cozi Family Organizer work better.

 

[Sparrow1]

I have the same issue currently on S8+ and have had it on S1 S4 and S6.

It is infuriating that this issue can span over a decade.

The guy that is trying to help, well done but now you have made the OP painstaking go through your exremely boring troubleshooting routine, where is the solution!

If you are gonna ask him to provide ALL that information to you, answering all of your slightly patronising questions then don't you think there is some responsibility to provide a resolution. If not then maybe you were not the one to respond with all those questions.

So it's not an issue you personally have seen posted but it is an issue! I have experienced exactly as the OP has expertly described and analysed his problem.

He has done his job. Somebody must have some resolution or pass it to... who is responsible for releasing

 

[Rukbat]

You didn't notice that the "give me the following information" posts and the "there's nothing you can do" post were made by different people?

Maybe it's you who needs to do something - learn how Android Central works. We aren't sitting in one boiler-room, getting paid for this, discussing the posts among ourselves. Some of us know a little about android, by owning a phone, some of us know a lot more about cellphones, having been in the industry since it started. We live all over the world.

And this not a job! We do it to help other people. If you don't like the help we're giving, don't read it.


(Each of us - including you - is responsible for his own posts.)