Here’s how Android 16 could make managing notifications easier than ever

Christine Romero-Chan / Digital Trends

Are you tired of the constant stream of notifications on your Android phone? Google may have a solution in development as part of its Android 16 update.

Recently, Android Authority discovered a hidden page in the latest Android 15 beta, located under Settings > Notifications, that references Bundled Notifications. This suggests a stable version of Android 15 QPR2 or the upcoming Android 16 release could introduce a new feature similar to Gmail’s notification grouping. This would allow similar notifications to be organized into bundles rather than displaying a long, overwhelming list of individual alerts.

For example, imagine having your notifications sorted into categories like “Social,” “Promotions,” “News,” and more. You would no longer need to scroll through a chaotic mix of messages, alerts, and updates.

While this feature is still in development and has not been officially confirmed, it has the potential to revolutionize how we manage notifications on Android devices such as the new OnePlus 13.

Currently, Android only groups notifications from the same app and does not categorize them.

Android Authority

The bundled notification feature isn’t currently operational in the Android 15 beta. However, the page describes it as follows: “Notifications with similar themes will be silenced and grouped together for a quieter experience. Bundling will override an app’s own notification settings.”

Android Authority suggests that the Android System Intelligence app will likely power the bundled notifications feature. This app already processes notifications to hide sensitive content from the lock screen and untrusted notification listeners.

The constant barrage of disorganized notifications can be frustrating on Android. It’s encouraging that Google is looking to enhance this by enabling users to categorize their notifications. Let’s hope this feature arrives sooner rather than later.

Android 15 was released just a few months ago. Despite this, we expect Android 16 to launch during the first part of 2025.  This update is expected to improve Android’s Privacy Dashboard and introduce a new Audio Sharing feature. The enhanced Privacy Dashboard will allow users to review a week’s worth of data instead of just the previous 24 hours. This change makes it easier to identify apps accessing permissions they shouldn’t be using.

The new Audio Sharing feature will enable users to share audio with multiple Bluetooth devices simultaneously. This way, you and a friend can enjoy watching something together without the hassle of swapping earbuds.

Android notifications may receive a new cooldown function as well. This feature would gradually reduce the volume of notifications from the same app over a specified period, helping to minimize distractions.

Bryan M. Wolfe has over a decade of experience as a technology writer. He writes about mobile.

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