A phone that flashes instead of ringing
Make a phone announce itself with light and with a buzz you can feel, so a call is never missed because the room was noisy or the sound was off.
Sound is the one everybody knows, and it is the one that fails most often — in a noisy kitchen, with the television on, with the phone face down on a table two rooms away.
The flash setting is popular with people of every age, for a plain reason: a phone lying face down on a table is silent and invisible, and a flashing one is neither.
Key points
- Make the camera light blink for calls and messages
- Keep the light blinking even when the phone is set to silent
- Choose a longer, more insistent buzz for calls
- Give yourself three chances to notice a call instead of one
What to remember
- On an iPhone this is Accessibility, then Audio & Visual, then LED Flash for Alerts. Android calls it Flash notifications and keeps it under Accessibility too, though not always in the same list. Start at Accessibility on either.
- Turning the sound off is a separate decision from turning the light off. Set both deliberately.
- Vibration patterns are chosen under the ringtone, and you can record your own by tapping it out.
Try this
Turn on LED flash for alerts on your own phone and ask somebody to call you while it is face down on the table. It is the sort of change you keep, and it takes under a minute to set up.
Practice: A phone that flashes instead of ringing. Your first lesson is free, with no account or card; the rest are part of a Lantern plan. Interactive lessons require JavaScript.