The fastest way to silence notifications

Open Control Center by clicking the icon in the top-right corner of your menu bar — it looks like a rectangle with sliders. Click Focus, then select Do Not Disturb. Notifications will stop appearing on your screen and in the notification center until you turn it off.

If you don't see a Control Center icon, go to System Settings > Control Center and make sure Focus is toggled on. You can also press and hold the Control Center icon to set how long Do Not Disturb stays active — for 1 hour, until evening, or until you leave your current location.

Do Not Disturb silences everything at once. If you want finer control — muting only certain apps or allowing calls from specific people through — you'll need to set up a Focus mode instead.

Key Takeaways

  • Do Not Disturb in Control Center is the quickest way to silence all notifications immediately.
  • You can set Do Not Disturb to turn off automatically after 1 hour, at a specific time, or when you leave a location.
  • Focus modes let you allow notifications from specific apps or people while blocking everything else.
  • Individual apps can be muted in System Settings without affecting other notifications on your Mac.

Setting up a Focus mode to allow some notifications through

Open System Settings > Focus. Click the + button to create a new Focus mode, or select an existing one like Work, Personal, or Sleep. Give it a name if you're creating a new one.

Under Allowed Notifications, click Add and choose which apps or people can send you notifications while this Focus is on. For example, you might allow Messages from your manager and Calendar notifications, but block everything else. Under Calls, you can allow incoming calls from specific contacts or from anyone in your Favorites.

Once you've set up your Focus mode, you can turn it on from Control Center the same way you'd turn on Do Not Disturb. You can also set it to turn on automatically at a specific time or location — for instance, a Work Focus that activates when you arrive at your office.

Muting notifications from a single app

If you only want to silence one app instead of all notifications, go to System Settings > Notifications. Scroll down the left sidebar to find the app you want to mute. Click it, then toggle off Allow Notifications.

You can also fine-tune how each app notifies you without turning notifications off entirely. In the same app settings, you can choose whether notifications appear in the notification center, on your lock screen, or as banners that pop up on your screen. You can also set whether the app can play a sound or badge your dock icon.

This approach is useful when one app is particularly noisy — like Slack or email — but you want to keep notifications from other apps active.

Silencing notifications on your lock screen and notification center

Notifications can appear in three places: as banners that pop up while you're working, on your lock screen when your Mac is locked, and in the notification center (accessed by clicking the date and time in the top-right corner). You can control where each app's notifications show up.

Go to System Settings > Notifications, select an app, and look for the Notification Style option. Choose Banners to see pop-ups only, Alerts to require you to dismiss them, or None to hide them entirely. You can also toggle off Show on Lock Screen to keep notifications from appearing when your Mac is locked, even if they still appear while you're using it.

Turning off notification sounds and badges

If you want to see notifications but don't want the sound or the red badge on your dock icon, you can disable those separately. Go to System Settings > Notifications, select an app, and toggle off Play Sound or Badge App Icon.

This is helpful when you want to stay aware of what's happening — like knowing you have unread emails — without being interrupted by sounds or visual alerts. The notification will still appear in your notification center and on your screen if you have banners enabled.

Scheduling Do Not Disturb to turn on and off automatically

You don't have to manually turn Do Not Disturb on and off every day. Go to System Settings > Focus > Do Not Disturb, then scroll down to Turn On Automatically. Click Add Schedule and choose when you want it to activate.

You can set it to turn on at a specific time each day, during your sleep schedule, or when you arrive at a certain location. If you set a time-based schedule, Do Not Disturb will turn on at that time and turn off the next morning or at whatever time you specify. Location-based schedules are useful if you want Do Not Disturb to activate automatically when you get to work or home.

You can create multiple schedules for different Focus modes — for example, a Work Focus that turns on at 9 a.m. on weekdays and a Sleep Focus that turns on at 10 p.m. every night.

Frequently Asked Questions

Will people know I'm using Do Not Disturb when they try to call or message me?

No. Do Not Disturb silences notifications on your Mac only — it doesn't send an away message or let people know you're unavailable. Messages and calls will still reach your Mac; you just won't be notified. If you want to let people know you're busy, you'll need to set a status in Messages or another app manually.

Can I allow calls from specific people while Do Not Disturb is on?

Yes, but only through a Focus mode, not through Do Not Disturb alone. Create a Focus mode, go to Calls, and select Allow Calls From. Choose specific contacts or your Favorites list. Calls from those people will ring through even when the Focus is active.

What's the difference between Do Not Disturb and a Focus mode?

Do Not Disturb blocks all notifications. A Focus mode lets you choose which apps and people can notify you. Do Not Disturb is faster for a quick silence, while Focus modes are better if you want some notifications to get through.

If I mute an app in Notifications settings, will it still show up in the notification center?

If you toggle off Allow Notifications entirely, the app won't send any notifications at all. If you just change the notification style to None, notifications won't appear as banners or on your lock screen, but they may still appear in the notification center depending on your settings.

Can I set different notification rules for work and personal time?

Yes. Create a Work Focus and a Personal Focus, each with different allowed apps and people. You can set them to turn on automatically at specific times or locations, so your Mac switches between them without you having to do anything.