imo notifications not working? Fix them on Android, brand by brand

imo notifications stop on Android when the phone shuts imo down in the background, so most of the fix is in your phone’s settings, not in imo. Let imo start by itself, take it off every cleaner and battery saver list, and check that imo’s tone and the phone’s notification switches for imo are on. Messages then arrive while imo is closed, instead of waiting until you open it.

That “only when I open it” feeling is the classic sign. You open imo in the evening and five messages from your brother land at once, all from the afternoon. He sent them on time. Your phone just didn’t let imo tell you.

Why are imo notifications not coming?

If your phone is an Infinix, Tecno, itel, Xiaomi, Vivo or Oppo, it ships with some of the strictest battery tools on Android: Phone Master on the Transsion brands, Autostart and Battery saver on Xiaomi, background power switches on Vivo and Oppo. Each of them stops apps that aren’t on screen. A stopped imo can’t turn an incoming message into a notification, so the message waits for you to open the app.

There are a few imo-side reasons too: a muted chat, imo’s own tone switched off, or a notification category you blocked by accident. And there’s the phone being on silent, which sounds obvious until you realise a notification that arrived quietly in the shade feels exactly like one that never came.

What does imo itself recommend?

imo has a short help page on exactly this problem, Missing notifications when I leave imo or open other apps (checked November 2026). Its seven steps, in our words, with a note on each:

1. Keep imo running in the background. The heart of it. The battery section below is how you do that on your brand.
2. Remove imo from the lock screen cleanup list of your phone and of any security app. Many phones clear apps when the screen locks. If imo is on that list, it dies every time you put the phone down.
3. Turn on imo’s notification options in the phone’s settings: sound, pop-up, banner, lock screen. Settings › Apps › imo › Notifications is where most phones keep them.
4. Make sure imo’s tone is on. In imo, go to the Me page, then Settings, then Notifications.
5. Keep the phone on sound mode and turn the volume up. Fair enough, though few people will leave sound on all night just for imo.
6. Switch network. Try mobile data if Wi-Fi is weak, or the other way round.
7. Reinstall the latest version of imo. Worth doing last, after the settings.

imo’s page adds one line for itel phones (made by Transsion): turn off Do Not Disturb and try again. We’d go further and check Phone Master too, since that is where Transsion phones keep their background limits.

Which battery and auto-start settings matter, by brand?

On any phone, open Settings › Apps › imo › Battery and choose Unrestricted. Then do the brand step from the table. Do it for imo and the two or three other apps that matter, not for everything; the battery cost of letting every app run freely is real. And if you press the big clean or boost button out of habit, lock imo in recent apps first, or stop pressing it. Android doesn’t need the help.

The open-source site Don’t kill my app documents the Transsion restrictions in detail, if you want to see why these phones are so strict.

Why does imo sometimes notify without the message?

You may have seen it: a notification from imo that names the sender but doesn’t show what they wrote, or that reads like a general new-message line. imo can notify without the real text. When that happens, the text was never in the notification, so your phone’s lock screen settings may not bring the words back.

This matters if you want an alarm for imo. Any app that reads notifications, Message Alarm included, sees only what imo puts in the notification. A rule that waits for the word “urgent” can miss an imo message that said “urgent”, because the notification never contained it. A sender name is much more reliable, which is why Message Alarm asks for at least one name on an imo rule.

How do I make one imo contact ring on silent?

If imo is how a relative abroad reaches you, the message that can’t be missed may well come at night, across time zones. imo’s tone follows the phone’s silent mode. Message Alarm is a free Android app that rings a loud alarm, even when your phone is on silent, when an important message arrives from a person or with a word you choose.

1. Install Message Alarm, allow Notification access, and allow Display over other apps.
2. Add imo as a watched app.
3. Under Only alarm for, type the person’s name exactly as imo shows it in the notification. An imo rule needs at least one name.
4. Optional: set Only during set hours, for example 10 PM to 7 AM if the messages you worry about come at night.
5. Choose the tone and how many times it rings (1 to 10), put the phone on silent, and ask that person to send an imo message.

The alarm plays on Android’s alarm stream, so silent and vibrate don’t mute it, and it rings through Do Not Disturb when alarms are allowed, which is the Android default. The screen turns on and, with Display over other apps allowed, a full-screen card shows who wrote. If you sleep through it, a “You missed an alarm” notification stays.

Names must match exactly. If imo shows your mother as “Ammu”, type “Ammu”, not her full name. Our guide to ringing on silent for certain contacts covers the other apps the same way.

What if it still doesn’t work?

Test with the screen off and the phone untouched for at least an hour. Short tests pass far too easily, because the harshest battery limits only start after the phone has been still for a while.

If imo still goes quiet, look at what the phone actually let through. Message Alarm’s Activity screen counts the notifications it checked and shows which matched, which rang, and why a match didn’t ring. If an imo message you know was sent shows no match at all, it most likely never reached the phone as a notification, and no app can alarm on a notification that was never posted. Message Alarm needs the same background permissions: its “Fix background issues” screen opens Battery and Auto-start for it, then asks “Is auto-start on?” because Android doesn’t tell apps.

The free plan watches 3 apps and rings up to 7 app alarms a day and 35 a week, with 2 auto-replies a week. Saved notifications, notification history and Smart Tray are free and unlimited. Your messages are checked on your phone and never uploaded, and the app doesn’t ask for contacts, SMS, call log or location permissions.