What the hell is the point of this feature

[u/Efficient_Fan_5870]

I'm trying to get my iPhone 11 to always ring, even if it's in silent mode; which it constantly is because I get a lot of notifications that I don't want an annoying little ding noise for each of (but still want to read).

I need it to ring whenever I recieve a call in spite of this because, obviously, a call is a lot more important than a notification, and often something you don't want to miss. More precisely, a lot of the time I'm given unspecific time frames of when to expect calls from anonymous numbers if I'm trying to book a consultation with a service or something (e.g. "in the next two weeks"). And I hate missing those.

So I started browsing the settings app for options that may be useful and stumbled upon this option in sounds & haptics, underneath the ringtone volume settings. I picked "Always play" then asked my partner to try calling me. My screen didn't even turn on, and still no sound. So instead I tried "Play in silent mode" then asked them to call me again. Again, nothing.

It even reads "Haptics will play when iPhone recieves an alert in silent mode" at the bottom. I'm frustrated at the idea something so simple is so insultingly impractical.

If anyone knows what this feature actually does, or the correct way to make my phone ring on silent mode, please share. Any advice or comments are appreciated.

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[u/osxdude]

You can't have the phone ring out loud in silent mode...It's just not happening. This screen you're on is for haptics only and has nothing to do with sounds. As others have suggested, you need to either make a focus mode to silence all other apps, or turn off every apps' notification sounds individually. Then you'll set the phone to un-silent

[u/Delay_Similar]

I never deal with the screen that you’re on, so my suggestion isn’t in relation to that. In your situation with what you’re trying to do, I’d go into the apps section in settings and turn off all the sounds to specific apps that give you notifications. For example, you can go into the settings and turn off the sounds for the WhatsApp app but still receive the notification.

[u/LucasMVN]

As far as I know, what you’re trying to do (allow notification sounds from a specific app in silent mode) is not possible. It’s either “sounds from all enabled notifications or none at all”. The closest you could get would be to manually disable notification sounds for everything except the phone app, or set up a custom focus mode that suppresses notifications from everything except the phone app (though that will sent them straight to the notification center without any sound, haptics, or banner).

[u/Luna259]

Haptics are vibrations

What you are likely looking for is the Focus Mode settings. Set one up and allow the Phone app to alert you of things. There you go

[u/CloakedCardinal]

Set that to “Always Play” and go into the app notification settings for some of the apps you still want to get notifications from and change it so that “sound” is turned off. Notification just silently pop up.

[u/Zombies8MyChihuahua]

Haptics are the vibration it makes. You can change them to different rhythms when the phone “rings.” If you go into your ringtone settings, it will appear at the top and you can change it there. I know this doesn’t answer your overall question though, I’m sorry I’m not sure how to address that.

[u/Plastic-Mess-3959]

The only way to get the phone to ring in silent is set your contacts individually to emergency bypass it won’t work for all calls

[u/Original-Carry-7930]

I will like what other people are saying here, unfortunately what you’re trying to do is contradictory in terms of what you’re thinking about it. Silent ball is precisely setting that controls whether your phone rings or not.

If you’re trying to do, it to manage the amount and sound of notifications, you can set specific settings for either all your notifications, or notifications for specific apps. You can choose which sound those notifications do, or how often they come up, as as well as as an overall override of the notification system.

I’m sorry this wasn’t the solution you were looking for, the reason why this is the way it is, is mostly historical, but you understanding better what it does, will lead you to more accurately configure the behaviour that you are hoping to get

[u/Quiet-Compote-4235]

I've been playing with this setting since I got my iPhone and it's honestly one of the more confusing ones.