How to get sound alerts with text messages and alarms while phone is in assistive access mode?

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Level 1

4 points

How to get sound alerts with text messages and alarms while phone is in assistive access mode?

My father has dementia and I have gotten him an Apple phone with the assistive access turned on. I want it to ding or make an alert when he receives a text from any of the contacts I have allowed it to communicate to. Also want to set alarms with noise so that he knows when to get up, go to exercise etc. … unless I am missing something, the only thing that makes noise are phone calls and the texts are unable to make noise, instead just have a “new” badge that shows up. He doesn’t have the best eyesight and having a text alert is needed. What am I missing?? Thanks for the help

iPhone SE, iOS 18

Posted on Jul 15, 2025 05:42 AM

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Answer 1

brbo

Level 8

38,065 points

Jul 16, 2025 06:07 PM in response to Nevetsb54

Hi Nevetsb54

welcome to this Apple (user-to-user) Community! Your father is indeed fortunate to have your assistance!

Re: "How to get sound alerts with text messages and alarms while phone is in assistive access mode?"

Am no expert in this area, yet your request to the community deserves some response

I understand your father's need to hear alerts and alarms with Assistive Access on his iPhone

You can adjust various settings to customize the Assistive Access apps,

and

you can add other apps (like the Clock app) if you want to:

While some settings can be changed within Assistive Access, for others you will need to exit it.

Apple support's article may help: Change Assistive Access settings on iPhone - Apple Support

and

there's a useful: Assistive Access User Guide - Apple Support

Note: To see all the detailed "How To" info : You can click "Table of contents" at the top of the Welcome page that opens from the link above

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Also: If you wish: Siri can be used for many things, including to announce messages (and calls)

(Seems the more you use Siri, the more Siri learns to tailor what is needed)

See: Change Siri accessibility settings on iPhone - Apple Support

Eg: says:

"Announce calls and notifications for specific apps

You can have Siri announce notifications and calls from apps like Messages on your iPhone speaker, supported headphones, when using CarPlay, and on MFi hearing devices.

Go to Settings > Accessibility > Siri, then turn on Announce Notifications on Speaker.
Tap Announce Notifications, then for each app, choose whether to announce all notifications or only time-sensitive notifications."

All the best :-)

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