Hi all,
Is it just me or is the notification centre on Mac a bit of a nightmare, at least with VoiceOver.
I press VO+O to open it, but when in there, VoiceOver focus keeps jumping back to the widgets section. So I'll navigate to a notification, clear it, and instead of staying in the notifications area, it jumps back to the widgets again. This kind of thing keeps happening.
And when I try to exit notification centre, I press VO+O again. With my partial sight, I can see it slide away, but VoiceOver focus seems to stay in the notification centre. Plus a few minutes ago, I tried to select the Clear All button, and VoiceOver just got completely stuck on a button called Menu.
Is it just me or is this thing not very user friendly?
Dave
By Dave Nason, 26 January, 2025
Forum
macOS and Mac Apps
Comments
Not you
I've hated notifications for years and have long yearned for some means to turn it off entirely.
This is why I use control option n mainly.
I use control option n to get to the notifications list, then press enter on the notification that’s on screen.
I’ve got to agree, notification center was a lot better in Sonoma and earlier versions.There has been a bug where you can’t access the Actions menu for a certain notification to clear or mark it as complete, etc. If this happens, just stop interacting once, and then it works. It’s a lot better than trying to navigate the notification center while voiceover tries it’s best to annoy you
If like me you have an…
If like me you have an activity for standard view switching to it solve most of the bugs. Agree it was working fine on 15.1 and earlier.
Just use the notifications…
Just use the notifications menu. Honestly, I hate that thing so much, like, it's utterly unusable. So use VO+N to access the notifications list, much less of a nightmare.
Maybe Apple followed Microsoft's lead
Why is it so difficult for desktops to provide accessible pop-up notifications?
Back when I was sighted, I struggled to use the notifications that popped up in the lower right corner of the Windows 7 desktop. I was running ZoomText, so I would arrow to the notification bubble so I could zoom in with the mouse scroll wheel, but the action of moving my mouse cursor over the notification window caused the window to vanish. Why? No reason, not that I ever learned of. That issue persisted for the lifetime of Windows 7.
What? Since Windows 10…
What? Since Windows 10 notifications have been more accessible than ever. Sorry but allow me to disagree with this, and yes it's off topic. Feel free to create the corresponding thread there and I'll be more than happy to answer. Hint: windows+shift+v.
What they broke in the…
What they broke in the notification center in MacOS 15 is a disaster.
Additionally, VO+N always says there are no notifications for me, despite the fact that there are plenty of them in the center.
VO+n was broken before 15.2…
VO+n was broken before 15.2 indeed, or maybe it got fixed in the 15.3 beta cycle I don't remember now. Agree it's not fun, but some users apparently haven't encountered this at all here.
It is possible to turn them…
It is possible to turn them all off but it is a one by one thing and when you install something new, there will be a system notification, which I think is what VO N brings up. VO O is the notification from the apps themselves, if that makes sense.
But yeah, I would like my computer to remain quiete and not bug notifications, I guess, are opt in, but it's kinda messy how we get to them.
Notification Center versus VoiceOver's notifications menu
My understanding of Notification Center (VO-O) versus VoiceOver's notifications menu (VO-N) is that Notification Center displays all system notifications, be they temporary banners or perpetual alerts, whereas VoiceOver's notifications menu only shows perpetual alerts.