iPhone alarm sound not playing on iOS 26

This was happening to me too. I had to go in settings, sounds and haptics, and turn the sound up. The update turns the sound completely down. Now it works like it used to. My phone is still on silent no sounds for texts and calls but my alarm now makes sound.

Another issue I noticed is that if you have headphones, AirPods, or other Bluetooth devices connected, the alarm will play through the headphones instead of the phone's internal speaker. This is an issue because sometimes I fall asleep with an AirPod in, but it is not in my ear in the morning. On iOS 18, that was not an issue because the phone would play the alarm; however, today it was playing through the earbuds, and I was late getting up.

My solution until Apple decides to fix it, is to disable the standby mode. Standby mode was causing the problems with my volume and power buttons not acting as snooze buttons and instead just silencing the alarm forever. With standby disabled, the alarm acts like it used to and the buttons all work as snooze buttons (at least for me it has worked)

I found this thread because I am having the same issue. I use earbuds plugged into the iPhone 15’s USB-C port to listen to a podcast at night. During sleep, the earbuds come out, of course (which is why I use wired ones). On iOS 18 and earlier, my alarm would sound through the iPhone even though the earbuds were still plugged in. After upgrading to iOS 26, the alarm sound stopped going through the iPhone speakers. Luckily, I sleep with the iPhone on the bed, so the vibration wakes me up. Note: I use the “Pick a song” option instead of the default Apple ringtones.

Here is what I discovered. If I use the default Apple alarm/ringtones, they play on both the iPhone and the Earbuds. If I decide to use a song from my own library, the sound does not come through the iPhone speakers as it used to; it only comes through the earbuds, which by morning are somewhere else other than in my ears, but still plugged into the iPhone. I am going to report this as a bug to Apple. I hope if enough of us do that they will fix it back to what it was pre-2026.

I had the same on my iPhone 13 Pro Max.

It was fixed after turning off Attention-Aware Features. You can find it in Settings —> Face ID & Passcode —> Attention-Aware Features.

Hope it works for you too.

Update: I turned it back on and the sound sill works.

Happening to me too, but can't confirm if it's just alarm sound, or any other sound. I realised this was buggy due to my lock sound disappear even switching it off/on in settings.

Disabling Attention Aware Features and reenabling it back brings my lock screen sound back.

I find out : clock- alarm settings- sound- haptics- None. And alarm will start working again.

Tom, dd you delete the alarms and add them back with stock sounds as recommended?

I’ve had this issue too. I used to snooze my alarm by clicking the on/off switch when I was too tired to look at the screen. But I worked out this morning that clicking the on/off switch now mutes the alarm. Bit annoying that I have to unlearn that muscle memory now

On iOS 26.0.1 iPhone 16 pro max but affects all iPhones, there is a bug related to Face ID and the setting “Attention Aware Features” and the volume of alarms. If enabled while looking at the phone the volume of alarms in the clock are low, half volume or less.

Turning off “Attention Aware Features” fixes the issue.

It seems to be limited to while you’re looking at the phone. It’s either extremely low or doesn’t play at all. I also turned it back on to verify, and I continued to look at the phone, even if I wasn’t on a particular screen as long as the screen itself wasn’t locked the alarm doesn’t play

It’s a bug that definitely Apple needs to look at or disassociate the alarms entirely from the setting

It just happened to me yesterday. Noticed the volume was at its lowest. I didn’t have any alarms set for Sunday but I tried turning the volume up and it kept going to the lowest setting. I hard reset and it went back to normal until this morning. Both my alarms volume was low to no noise and I was late for work. I tried hard resting again. But I can’t afford to be late to work. Apple fix this ASAP. TO ADD TO THIS MY AWARENESS IS OFF AS WELL AS FOCUS. So this is a major issue that NEEDS TO BE FIXED. it’s costing millions of people to miss work and wages.

IOS 26.1 This problem of alarm sounds not audibly heard if at all has been resolved with Face ID “Attention Aware Features”. Alarms now play at full volume regardless of the setting on or off.

On iOS 26.0.1 iPhone 16 pro max but affects all iPhones, there is a bug related to Face ID and the setting “Attention Aware Features” and the volume of alarms. If enabled while looking at the phone the volume of alarms in the clock are low, half volume or less.

Turning off “Attention Aware Features” fixes the issue.

I have a very similar situation, before the iOS 26 update I would use my phone to play ambience tracks at low volume on a Bluetooth speaker, then the alarm would play on my phone at a higher volume with different tracks rather than Apple default ringtones. iOS 26 forced me to change my sleep routine temporarily, I rather switch to Android to continue my routine rather than continue with this option. I just fully reset my phone, hoping to resolve the problem, but the issue remains. I am thankful I tested the alarms immediately after the update, so I was not surprised the following day. Always test devices immediately after an update, never know what issues will occur.