How to Turn Off Story Notifications on Snapchat
Snapchat's notification system is designed to keep you engaged — but that engagement can quickly tip into noise. If you're getting pinged every time someone posts a Story, understanding exactly how Snapchat's notification layers work will help you get control without accidentally muting things you actually want to see.
What Are Story Notifications on Snapchat?
Story notifications alert you when someone you follow posts a new Story. These are separate from snap notifications, chat notifications, and friend activity alerts. Snapchat treats each of these as its own notification category, which means turning off one type doesn't automatically affect the others.
By default, Snapchat sends Story notifications for accounts you've subscribed to or have enabled notifications for individually. Public creators, friends, and brand accounts can all trigger these alerts — and they stack up fast if you follow a lot of active users.
How to Turn Off Story Notifications for Specific Friends or Creators
The most targeted option is disabling Story notifications on a per-account basis. This lets you keep alerts for close friends while silencing everyone else.
On iPhone or Android:
- Open Snapchat and go to your Friends list or search for the person's profile.
- Tap and hold on their name (or tap their Bitmoji to open their profile).
- Tap the bell icon or look for "Story Notifications" in the menu.
- Toggle Story notifications off for that specific account.
This approach works well if there are just a handful of accounts generating unwanted alerts. It's granular, reversible, and doesn't affect your broader notification settings.
How to Turn Off All Story Notifications at Once
If you want to silence Story alerts across the board, Snapchat's in-app notification settings give you a category-level toggle.
Steps:
- Tap your profile icon in the top-left corner of the Snapchat home screen.
- Tap the gear icon (Settings) in the top-right.
- Scroll down to "Notifications" under the My Account section.
- Look for "Friend Stories" and/or "Subscriptions" — these are the two main Story notification categories.
- Toggle either or both off.
🔔 Snapchat separates Friend Stories (from people you're mutual friends with) from Subscription Stories (from public accounts or creators you follow). Disabling both covers most Story notification sources.
Using Your Phone's System Settings as a Backup
If in-app toggles aren't working the way you expect, your device's OS-level notification controls give you another layer of control.
On iOS:
- Go to Settings → Notifications → Snapchat
- From here you can disable all Snapchat notifications, or customize alert styles, sounds, and badges independently.
On Android:
- Go to Settings → Apps → Snapchat → Notifications
- Android's notification channels may let you disable specific categories like Stories without turning off all Snapchat alerts, though this depends on your Android version and device manufacturer's UI.
The trade-off with OS-level controls is bluntness — you're often working with broader categories rather than the fine-grained options inside the app itself.
The Variables That Affect What You're Seeing
Not all Story notifications come from the same source, and that affects which settings actually fix the problem:
| Notification Source | Where to Turn It Off |
|---|---|
| Stories from mutual friends | In-app → Notifications → Friend Stories |
| Stories from creators/public accounts | In-app → Notifications → Subscriptions |
| Spotlight or Discover content | In-app → Notifications → Spotlight/Discover |
| All Snapchat notifications | OS-level notification settings |
| Specific person's Stories | That person's profile → Story Notifications |
App version matters here too. Snapchat updates its interface regularly, and the exact label or location of a setting can shift between versions. If a step doesn't match what you're seeing, check that your app is updated — or look under nearby menu items, since Snapchat occasionally reorganizes these controls.
What Doesn't Change When You Mute Story Notifications
Turning off Story notifications does not:
- Remove you from someone's Friends list
- Prevent their Stories from appearing in your Stories feed when you open the app
- Affect snap or chat notifications from the same person
- Unsubscribe you from a creator's account
You'll still see their Stories when you open Snapchat — you just won't get an alert pushing you there. This distinction matters if your goal is reducing interruptions versus actually curating your feed.
Different Users, Different Results 🎯
How disruptive Story notifications feel — and how much effort is worth putting into managing them — varies significantly by how you use Snapchat.
Someone who follows dozens of active creators will experience a very different notification volume than someone who only uses Snapchat to stay in touch with a small group of close friends. A user on an older Android device might find that OS-level category controls are less granular than what a newer iOS device offers. And someone who uses Snapchat for both personal and professional reasons might want to keep subscription alerts on during work hours and off at night — a setup that requires a different approach entirely.
The right combination of in-app settings and OS-level controls depends on the shape of your Snapchat use, which accounts generate the most noise for you, and how much granularity you need.