Customize Your Android Phone’s Colored LED Notification Light
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If you own an Android smartphone or tablet, you’re likely familiar with your device’s LED notification light. It’s a way for Android to communicate information to you even when your screen is off. A blinking blue light may mean you have a notification waiting, while a blinking red light may mean your battery is low.
Helpful though these Android notifications can be, their usefulness is hampered if two different apps are using the same color or if you simply don’t know what each blink means. Thankfully, the color and meaning of these notifications are fully customizable. Here are some of Techlicious’s favorite apps that let you choose how and why your LED blinks.
Light Manager
The free Light Manager app lets you configure the LED color and flash frequency for different types of notifications and apps, along with vibrations and sounds. You can set notifications by contact, so you can have your phone flash one color if you get a text from the kids, and another color if you get a text from work. There’s even a Sleeping Time mode, where you can disable flashing during the hours you’re normally asleep.
Light Manager is available as a free download from Google Play.
Light Flow
Few apps give you more control over your LED pulse notification light than Light Flow. Available in both free and premium versions, the app allows you set your choice of hundreds of different colors for each notification type and app. You control the flash rate, the duration of the notification, and whether notifications colors cycle (or if just the highest priority one is displayed).
The free version of the app takes about 20 seconds for flashes to change color; the paid version waits just 2.5 seconds. The paid version also lets you customize notification sounds and vibration patterns, giving you even more control. It has a sleep mode too, so those flashes don’t become a nuisance at 4AM.
Light Flow Lite (free) and the premium Light Flow (2.49) are both available for download via Google Play.
LED Blinker Notifications
Not all Android phones have notification lights. If yours doesn’t, check out the paid LED Blinker Notifications app. It gives you the same control over notification colors and blink timing as the other apps, putting the colored dot directly on your screen. You can customize notification vibrations and sounds through the app, too. Notifications automatically turn off when you’d like so you won’t be distracted from getting a good night’s sleep.
Galaxy S10 Doesn’t Have a Notification Led
One of the leading phone manufacturers, Samsung, recently announced its Galaxy S10 lineup, but it didn’t come with a lot of surprises since we already knew many of the details about this device.
Due to media leaks and hands-on demo, we already knew that the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) has decided to keep the much-coveted headphone jack, but in the process decided to eliminate one feature that is loved by most customers, the notification LED.
The main question now is, why did Samsung decide to remove the notification LED from the Galaxy S10, and, what can users expect to replace it?
Is it Useful?
It’s not unknown that notification LEDs have been an essential part of Samsung smartphones for years. Android users might not really remember phones without these lights, and for good reason; they were practical and Smart looking.
Notification LEDs offer a very simple way to know whether you have an alert on your phone without intruding; they don’t make a sound, nor light-up displays, they are just a small and convenient blink.
So why did they opt out of such an important feature? Well, for one it might not be an intentional omission, but not in the sense of an outdated port. On the contrary, the notification LED is just a victim of Samsung’s bold new design.
In their quest to offer a seamless edge to edge infinity display, something had to go in order to achieve that. The notification LED can no longer be present when the space it needs has been taken for coveted screen real estate.
Without a doubt, longtime users will be disappointed. Although with their intact headphone jacks, the Galaxy S10 still holds rank over most of the smartphone world but is yet another smartphone to have the notification LED stripped off it.
What is the way forward from here?
While Samsung’s ”Edge Lighting” is almost like a notification LED, instead of being a single light, the whole border of the display is what lights up.
Although this feature works only when you are interacting with your phone, it is a great replacement for notification popups, and it also provides you with a lot of variety when it comes to user customization. It is not exactly the notification LED, but it is still better than not having anything.
If you are familiar with the Edge Lighting’s former limitations, then you should get some comfort knowing that Samsung opted to update this feature with One UI.
Even at that, it is not still quite a true replacement for the simple and cool nature of the notification LED. All we can do is hope that Samsung adds a display version of the notification LED, or better still, makes good use of the ring light that surrounds the selfie camera as a notification LED.
Unfortunately, there hasn’t been any official plans for any of these replacements currently.
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Get a Notification Light on Your Android Phone in 2023 with aodNotify
Do you miss the days when Android phones had a front-facing LED for notifications? If so, do you wish to get it on your current Android smartphone?
Well, it turns out you can get a notification LED on an Android in 2022, albeit a virtual one. It requires the aodNotify app and a compatible device—the newer ones from Samsung, OnePlus, and Google—to work.
Let’s take a look at aodNotify, its features, and how you can use it to add a notification LED to your Android device.
What is aodNotify?
aodNotify is an Android app that gives you the functionality of an LED notification light without the LED. It’s compatible with smartphones from Samsung, OnePlus, and Google and is pretty easy to use.
With aodNotify, you get various customization options, wherein you can choose from different notification light styles and show the notification light around the camera cutout or the screen edges.
Not just that, you can upgrade to aodNotify Pro and unlock more customization options. Of these, being able to add a notification LED dot to your device’s status bar is perhaps the most appealing feature.
aodNotify Features
Although aodNotify comes across as a simple app, it has many features underneath. Here’s a list of some of the notable aodNotify features:
- Multiple notification light styles: camera cutout, screen edge, LED dot
- Custom app and contact notification colors
- Interval mode and night time mode to save battery
- Notification preview
- Minimal battery consumption
- Charging/low battery indicator
How to Enable aodNotify
First, download the aodNotify on your compatible Samsung, OnePlus, or Google device from the links below.
Once the app is downloaded and installed, hit the Next button on the welcome screen. Now, before you can enable aodNotify and start using it, you need to complete a checklist first to set it up.
Here’s what these checklist tasks are and how to navigate them:
- Select appsFirstly, you need to select which apps can activate the aodNotify notification light on your device. Click on Select apps and choose the apps for which you’d like to receive notifications.
- Notification accessNext, aodNotify needs access to your device notifications to access them and send you alerts. To grant it notification access, tap on Notification access and allow aodNotify access to your system notifications.
- Enable AOD Since aodNotify works with always-on display (AOD), it must be enabled on your device. Click on the Enable AOD option in aodNotify checklist and toggle the AOD option in your device settings.
- Draw on screen Draw on screen is kind of like an Android permission, which allows an app to view all kinds of activities happening on top of other apps on the device. Since aodNotify deals with notifications, it needs this information to function. Tap on Draw on screen in the checklist and enable the option on the next screen to give aodNotify complete control over your device.
Hit the Done! button when you’ve enabled all the options on the checklist.
aodNotify Options
With aodNotify configured, when a notification arrives on your phone now, aodNotify will alert you of the same with the notification light. It will show these alerts using the default configuration settings (style, color, size, etc.) for the notification light.
However, if for some reason you don’t like an element in this configuration or wish to explore more customization options, you can do so in the app’s settings. Here’s how to change some of these aodNotify settings.
How to Choose Which Apps Can Activate Notification Light
While aodNotify lets you select which apps can activate the notification light on your device during its initial setup, if you wish to do it later, you can do so using these steps:
- Select Notifications on the aodNotify home screen.
- Tap on Apps under Notifications and toggle on/off the button next to the apps you want to select/deselect.
How to Set Battery Events to Activate Notification Light
Apart from incoming notifications from apps, aodNotify can also display notifications in response to certain battery events like when the phone is charging, it’s fully charged, or when the battery is below 15%.
Follow the steps below to set any of these triggers:
- Click on Notifications from the home screen and select Battery under Notifications.
- Toggle the switch next to the trigger you want to activate. (You might need to upgrade to the aodNotify Pro to use all triggers.)
How to Customize aodNotify Notification Light
aodNotify lets you customize different aspects of the notification light like its style, animation effects, and dimensions so you can customize the light as per your requirements.
Change Notification Light Style
- Select Notification light from the home screen.
- Click on Style under Appearance and select the radio button next to the style you want under Screen is on. Available options include Camera edge, Screen edges, and LED Dot (on Pro version). Choose Camera edge if your device has a camera cutout, whereas if it has a notch, go with Screen edges.
- If you’d like to have the notification light on even when the screen is off, you can turn on the radio button next to the options under Screen is off. Here, you also get an additional option—Fingerprint sensor—where you can put the notification light.
Change Animation Effects
- Go into Notification light and select Effects.
- Select the radio button next to the effect you want to use. You can preview each effect by tapping on it.
- Scroll down to Effect settings at the bottom and use the Speed slider to adjust the effect speed. (Again, effect options are limited in the free version.)
Change Dimensions of the Notification Light
- Select Notification light and tap on Dimensions on the following screen.
- Use the slider under Camera edge to adjust the thickness or resize the notification light.
- If the notification light is obstructing with a status bar item, you can fine-tune its position using the Offset sliders under Camera edge – Fine tuning.
How to Change Color Settings of Notification Light
aodNotify gives you the freedom to choose the notification light color for your device. Here’s how to do this:
- Select Colors on aodNotify home screen.
- Tap on App colors to set a custom color for each app.
- Next, if you’ve enabled battery events, tap on Battery colors and select a custom color for each event.
- Similarly, if you want to change colors on messages from specific contacts, tap on Contact colors and choose the color you like.
- Besides, aodNotify also has a default color for the notification light. Tap on Default color under General and select a color. (If you’re using aodNotify Pro, you can select Auto color to customize the light automatically depending on the app icon.)
Get Notified Differently With aodNotify
With aodNotify, you can change the way you get notified on your Samsung, OnePlus, or Google smartphone. Now, instead of relying on your phone’s sound/vibration, you have a notification light on the device that glows up every time there’s an incoming notification. Not just that, it also alerts you of events like low battery status, which can prove quite useful.
While we’ve tried to cover the essential aspects of aodNotify in this guide, there are still several customization options on the app that we haven’t discussed. Consider checking out these options to personalize the notification light even further.
How to Change Your LED Notification Colors on Android
The option to change the color of your LED notification is probably one of the most sought out features for any smartphone. Unfortunately, not all Android devices can do this. Some smartphone models from Nexus, LG, Sony, and Samsung phones can change the color of the LED light with a few tweaks. However, as we have already mentioned, this feature is supported by a very limited number of models.
Some Android devices don’t need outside help or apps to achieve this, but since most do, we’re going to mention a few apps that let you do so. If your LED Notification light is off by default, don’t worry, we’ll show you how to switch that on so you can get started.
How to Turn on Your Notification LED
On some, but not most, Android devices, the LED light is turned off for notifications by default. Or in other cases, the LED light is just hard to see or notice, like on the Nexus 5X. Thankfully, it’s easy to turn them on, even if you’ve had them off the whole time you’ve had your device, or just haven’t noticed the light in the first place.
Step 1: Open Your Settings
Open your Settings menu from any location you want, how you get there doesn’t matter.
Step 2: Find Sound Notification
Depending on the model, and version of Android you’re using, this will be slightly different. In my case, on a Moto G3 running Android 5.1, I open Sound notification under the Device section.
Step 3: Pulse Notification Settings
Once again, this differs from version to version, but on 5.1, under Sound notification, look for any settings relating to pulse notifications.
You’ll either see a toggle switch or need to access a new menu for the setting. Either way, enable pulse notifications from here to enable your LED notification light.
The Best Android Apps for Changing Your LED Notification Light
Now that you know how to turn on your LED notification light if it wasn’t already, it’s time to download an app that’ll help you finally change that color from white to something else. To get that done, I have two different apps for two different Android users.
1.
First up, there’s the Light Manager – LED Settings.
Up front, Light Manager requires root access if you are on Android device running Android 4.2 and below. If you’re on 4.3 or higher, no root is required. Light Manager’s compatibility is hard to pin down, so you’ll need to try the app before you know if it’ll work for your Android device.
If Light Manager works for you, it’s easy to use to set different lights for different notifications and more from a large color spectrum.
Light Manager Download
2.
The next app is Light Flow – LED Control, which has a free version and a pro version for 2.49.
Light Flow is an app that’s highly rated and well received by most users but has the same compatibility issues that Light Manager has. If you can get it to work after downloading, you’re golden, but if you can’t, then you can’t do anything about it.
The main difference between the free version and the pro version is the amount of utility and customization. While the pro version has over 600 different notification lights available to set, the free version has a very specific list of custom light notifications. Take a look at both Google Play pages to see which version suits your needs.
Light Flow Download (Free)
Light Flow Download (Paid)
If your Android has the compatibility, and a working LED notification light, both of these apps will get the job done.
Conclusion
There are plenty of benefits to setting different colored pulse notifications for different apps and messages. If you’ve ever wanted to tell what the pulsing light means without waking your phone, look into either of the light apps above.
If you can’t get either app to work and are sure your Android is compatible, we can help you as soon as possible when you leave a comment below.
Jagdish is an Android troubleshooter who loves talking tech and discussing technology’s impact on humanity. He is passionate about writing and fond of technology—with a zeal for Android problem-solving. When Jag isn’t writing or discussing tech and marketing, he’ll be smashing cricket balls or shooting hoops on the basketball court.
Samsung Galaxy S10 Notification LED Alternatives (S10, S10 Plus and S10e)
It is quite disappointing that one of the most anticipated smartphones of the year launches without LED notification feature. Most of the users didn’t use Notification as per the Manufacturer thought. But it is not true. So, that Manufacturers removing Notifications LED from the devices. The Samsung Galaxy S10 does not support LED notification, and its subsequent variants won’t come with this feature either. However, there are other ways to get notified of new alerts on the device. There are about ways to get notified about new messages or alerts on your new S10.
Since this feature on the device, users are searching to know if there are possible ways to receive notifications. Well, it is essential because if you don’t get notified instant notifications, you could miss some important messages.
How to get notified of new messages and alerts on Samsung Galaxy S10
Method one: Camera Cut Out
Most of the people asked us can we get the notification using the new camera cut out in the display. The Answer is “Yes.” But you have to install an app from Play store.
Snapchat Pixy Drone Demo
- Download and install Always On Edge App from Play Store.
- Open the app. Based on your needs to configure the time and Personalized settings.
- Scroll down, Enable Edge Lightning Around Notch Only. That’s all. Hereafter you will get notified by Camera cut out Lightning. I love this method. It gives us a feel; there is a notification LED.
Method Two: Enable edge lighting
This is the second method we are going to discuss in this article. It is all about activating a hidden feature on your S10 device which will trigger lights to display on the edges of your screen display once a notification enters. Even you can customize how this light show shines, the color that should display, and quite other flexible options.
It may even be that this is better than the native LED light notification which you cannot fully customize how it acts. Also, to activate this feature isn’t a stressful thing to do. It is just as if you’re trying to enable your Bluetooth from the device settings menu.
Go to device Settings
Further, scroll down until you see the Edge Screen option, then, touch on it
There are two options here, select/click on Edge Lighting.
This will cause your device to show lights around its edges when you receive new notifications. Also, the options to customize this feature are available right on the menu. So, if you wish to customize the lights that show and how long they should shine, you can as well set them from here. Edge Lighting is not restricted to any form of alert; once a new notification enters your S10 display, the lights start shinning immediately and lasts for the duration you set.
Now, let’s move to the next method through which you’ll be notified of new notifications.
Method Three: Use your back flashlight
At the rear side of this device lies a flashlight sensor primarily meant to illuminate the photos you take in low light areas. Nevertheless, you can configure this flashlight to serve as a notification for new alerts received on your Galaxy S10 device. This now means that the rear flashlight on Samsung Galaxy S10 helps for multipurpose. But, you’ll not get to see this flashlight notification if the device is dropped on a surface with the rear side facing down; thus, it has a disadvantage.
Similarly, the process to activate this feature is just like the one above. The feature is hidden in your device settings. Initially, you may not know that activating a function found in the “Accessibility” menu would trigger notifications alerts. This setting is, however, available as an advanced setting. But you don’t have to panic; there’s nothing superior about it.
Go to your Samsung device settings menu and scroll down to the Accessibility option
Tap on the option and further tap on the “Advanced Settings” option
Once this option is activated on your S10, the flashlight at the rear side would dim twice each time there’s a new notification. Some people believe this is the best way to get notified on new alerts, but, unfortunately, we don’t agree to that. This is because, unless the device is kept on a surface with its rear panel facing up, that’s when you can see the dimming flashlight and check out the notification you’ve got. Everyone’s got a different preference anyway.
Let’s get to see the last method for this cause. It may be the one you’d prefer over the orders.
Method Four: E nable screen flash
This is the last method for this action. It is not so different from the other ones we have discussed so far. You’ll find the settings to activate this feature in the same place where the “camera flash” is located. How does this option notify you of new alerts? It will cause your screen to flash a light upon any new notification received on your S10 device. It doesn’t matter if the device screen is on or not. This feature is quite better because it is significant.
Go to your Samsung device settings menu and scroll down to the Accessibility option
Tap on the option and further tap on the “Advanced Settings” option
This feature is found below the Camera Flash option.
Conclusion
It is true that there is no LED notification indicator available on the Samsung Galaxy S10, but, as you can see, there are up to a lot of flexible options through which you can get notified of new alerts the device. I Prefer Camera Cut-out Flash. Well, you can Also activate two of these features at the same; enabling the Edge Lighting and the Camera Flash options would be a perfect match. The Screen Flash option is quite good, but it is not the best.
So, if you have got the S10 already, you’ve just been shown how you could get alerted of new notifications, so you don’t miss out on certain things.
Conclusively, asides these methods discussed in this article, there is virtually no other way to receive notifications on Galaxy S10. Also, these methods will work on the upcoming models with also do not feature a notification LED light indicator.
Selva Ganesh is the Chief Editor of this Blog. He is a Computer Science Engineer, An experienced Android Developer, Professional Blogger with 8 years in the field. He completed courses about Google News Initiative. He runs Android Infotech which offers Problem Solving Articles around the globe.
