Table of Contents
What is Focus Mode?
Apple’s Focus Mode was introduced in iOS 15 and later versions of the operating system. The feature lets users customize their notifications and app alerts based on their current activity or state of mind.
With Focus Mode, users can choose from pre-defined modes such as Work, Personal, Sleep, Fitness, and more. Users can also create custom modes with specific apps and contacts that they want to receive notifications while blocking out all others.
When a user activates a Focus Mode, notifications from other apps will be muted or sent to a designated notification center for later viewing. The user can still access all apps on their device, but the ones not allowed during Focus Mode will have a grayed-out icon to indicate they are muted.
Users can also set up automatic replies for text messages while in Focus Mode. It indicates to others that the user is unavailable at the moment. Focus Mode can be activated manually or set to turn on automatically based on the user’s location or time of day.
Types of Pre Defined Share Focus Status:
The feature helps a lot when you want to focus on important tasks without any interruption and distraction. The feature comes with a few default focus status modes such as Do Not Disturb, Personal, Work, Sleep, Fitness, and Driving. Users can also create Custom Focus Mode as per their needs.
With focus mode on, you can decide which contacts and apps can send you notifications when you’re busy doing something. You can also allow time-sensitive and emergency notifications and important calls with the help of the Share Focus Status feature. You can schedule focus modes to automatically update at a given time.
Here are the pre-defined Focus modes that come with Apple’s Focus feature:
Personal
This mode is designed for personal time. It allows you to stay connected with close family and friends while limiting notifications from other apps.
Work
This mode is optimized for work time. It enables you to focus on work-related tasks and prioritize notifications from work-related apps.
Sleep
This mode helps you get a good night’s sleep by muting non-essential notifications and apps
Fitness
This mode is tailored for fitness and workout sessions.
Gaming
This mode helps you stay focused on gaming by prioritizing gaming notifications and muting non-essential notifications.
You can also create custom Focus modes and choose which apps and people can get through during each mode. For example, you could create a Focus mode for studying or meditation, which would mute all notifications except for the apps you need for those activities.
What Is Share Focus Status?
Share Focus Status is a feature that indicates contacts on your phone why you’re not responding to them. It’s a way to tell your contacts that you have muted notifications, so can’t respond immediately.
When you enable Share Focus Status, you can choose which contacts can see your current status whether personal, Work, Sleep, or any custom modes. This feature is especially useful if you work remotely, as it notifies your teammates about your current availability status.
When someone shares their Focus Status with you, you will see a notification in Messages or other apps. You can also customize your own status message and add a brief description, such as “In a meeting” or “On a break.”
Note that when you share your Focus Status, you are only sharing the name of the status you have selected (such as “Personal” or “Work”), and not the specific apps or contacts you have allowed or blocked during that mode.
Why Do You Share Your Focus Status?
It’s sometimes great to stay away from unwanted phone alerts and notifications. Silencing notifications can help you prevent distractions from annoying alerts and calls.
By Sharing your Focus Status you can tell your phone contacts that you’re busy and will contact them soon. Sharing your Focus Status can help improve communication and productivity while respecting your own and other’s boundaries and needs.
How to Share Your Focus Status?
You can share your Focus status by following the below steps:
- Go to iOS settings and find the “Focus” option signified by a moon symbol.
- Select the Focus Mode of your choice from the given options
- Find “Focus Status” under the options.
- Tap “Focus Status” and turn on the feature.
As your focus mode is on, people will get notified that you are away whenever they will try contacting you. To change the focus modes, you can repeat the step.
How to Turn Off Share Focus Status?
Sharing your Focus Status is a default feature of iOS 15. However, you can use Focus Mode privately by turning off your Focus Status. Here are the steps:
- Tap on “Focus” in your Settings app.
- Choose the Focus Mode you want to stop sharing
- Tap on “Focus Status” under the options and toggle the switch. Now your contacts will not get any notification about your Focus Status when using this Focus Mode.
- Repeat these steps to choose other Focus Modes you don’t want to share with contacts.
How to customize your Focus Status?
Here are the steps to customize your Focus Status on an iPhone or iPad running iOS 15 or later:
- Open the Control Center on your device by swiping down from the top right corner of the screen (on devices with Face ID) or swiping up from the bottom of the screen (on devices with a Home button).
- Tap the Focus icon (it looks like a crescent moon with a dot in the middle).
- Scroll down to the bottom of the list of pre-defined Focus modes and tap the “Customize” button.
- Choose a name for your custom Focus mode, such as “Study” or “Meditation”.
- Tap “Add Apps” to choose which apps you want to allow during this mode. You can also tap “Suggested Apps” to see recommendations based on your usage history.
- Tap “People” to choose which contacts you want to allow during this mode. You can choose from recent contacts or search for specific people.
- Toggle on any other settings you want to include, such as “Do Not Disturb” or “Scheduled”.
- Tap “Done” to save your custom Focus mode.
Once you have created a custom Focus mode, you can activate it by tapping the Focus icon. You can then select your custom mode from the list. You can also set up automatic activation based on the time of day or location by going to Settings > Focus > Focus Automation.
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