When speaking a notification on the Lock Screen or Notification Center, VoiceOver will speak most of the notification twice

Category
VoiceOver Announcements/Feedback
Severity
Minor

Description

When VoiceOver focus is placed on a notification on either the Lock screen or Notification Center, VoiceOver will typically speak most of the notification twice.

For instance, this is how a notification might appear visually:

SKY NEWS, 5 minutes ago
Sky News, Man bites dog, 2:42 pm

However, in the above example, what VoiceOver actually speaks is:

SKY NEWS, 5 minutes ago
Sky News, Man bites dog, 2:42 pm
Sky News, Man bites dog

This behaviour appears to present itself on notifications from the system or any app, and it is the main part of the notification which is repeated.

Steps to reproduce

  1. Ensure that VoiceOver is enabled.
  2. Ensure that there is 1 or more notifications on the Notification Center.
  3. Activate the Notification Center (or go to the Lock Screen).
  4. Place VoiceOver focus on to a notification.
  5. Listen to what VoiceOver speaks.

Instead of speaking the notification as it appears visually on screen, you should find that the main part of the notification is spoken twice.

Bug First Encountered

iOS/iPadOS 15.2

Device(s) bug has been encountered on

iPhone

How often the bug occurs

Always

Apple feedback #

FB9860473

Status

Fixed

Fixed In

iOS/iPadOS 15.4

Options

Comments

By Holger Fiallo

2 years 2 months ago

Agree. Also when phone on mute, voiceover continue to speak notification. Started with iOS 15. Bug?

By Jo Billard

2 years 2 months ago

It's probably been doing this for longer, but it wouldn't surprise me if I was too distracted to notice. I tried pausing Voiceover with a two-finger single tap, but it just resumed speaking. I would be OK with this if Voiceover would actually pause, or if there was a setting to turn this feature on or off. There are times when I've missed the notification and wouldn't mind the repeat, but being forced to listen to it is too much.

By PaulMartz

2 years 2 months ago

Member of the AppleVis Blog Team

When a notification has focus and you flick up, VoiceOver should immediately stop reading the notification and announce the Clear action. But it doesn't do this consistently. Often, I must move focus away from the notification, then back to it. After doing so, flick up interrupts reading the notification as expected.

There simply seems to be many things wrong with VoiceOver and the lock screen. Another long-standing issue is VoiceOver inconsistently announcing the time on wake.

By Jo Billard

2 years 2 months ago

It's been that way for a while and it's really annoying, especially when it's for a meeting I need to join over Zoom.

By clarence carter

2 years 1 month ago

I spoke with Apple support, and the referred me to the apple store for assistance. their responce is that it is a software issue, which they were able toduplicate. They said that it had something to do with the way that IOS updates the notifications.

For now, I am just silencing them with two fingers. However, it is a real pain. .

By the way, I have changed voices with the same result. Don't bother to restore, the result is the same.

Anybody know who to talk to about this?

By Unregistered User (not verified)

2 years 1 month ago

""""
Agree. Also when phone on mute, voiceover continue to speak notification. Started with iOS 15. Bug
""""

Have you turn off speech while the phone is being locked?
Yes, I understand that you won't be able to hear the caller contact name.
Or you have muted speech simply?

From an useless individual written.

Cheers!