Batching notifications three times a day
A randomized field experiment found three predictable notification batches a day beat both real-time alerts and switching notifications off entirely.
The short version
In a randomized field experiment, people whose phone notifications were delivered in three predictable batches a day felt more attentive, more productive, in a better mood and more in control of their phones than people who got notifications as usual. Hourly batching did little, and turning notifications off entirely backfired: it raised anxiety and fear of missing out.
What the researchers did
The team built an app that could hold back a phone's notifications and release them on a schedule. They recruited 237 smartphone users in India and randomly assigned them, for two weeks, to one of four conditions:
- Control: notifications as usual.
- Hourly batches: notifications delivered once an hour, on the hour.
- Three batches a day: notifications delivered at 9am, 3pm and 9pm.
- No notifications: alerts withheld entirely.
Participants completed daily diary surveys on psychological and health outcomes, and the app logged how they used their phones.
What they found
- Compared with the control group, the three-times-a-day group felt more attentive and productive, was in a better mood, felt more in control of their phones and reported fewer phone interruptions.
- The hourly group saw little benefit relative to the control group.
- The no-notifications group gained few of the benefits and reported higher anxiety and fear of missing out.
- The authors' analysis suggests inattention and phone-related fear of missing out help explain these results.
Limits and caveats
The study ran for two weeks with participants in a single country, so whether the effects last, or generalize to other places and kinds of work, is untested. The outcomes are mostly self-reported. The batches were delivered at fixed times that might suit some schedules better than others, and only one batching frequency (three a day) clearly helped — it is not known whether two or four would do as well.
What it means for how you work
The lesson is that predictability, not silence, is what helps. Most phones and computers can now hold non-urgent notifications and deliver them as a scheduled summary; setting two or three delivery times around your focus blocks gives you uninterrupted stretches without the worry of missing something for a whole day. Pair it with a few allowed exceptions for genuinely urgent contacts. This builds on earlier evidence that a week of alerts on increased inattention (Kushlev et al., 2016).