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Subscribe from your phone
You can use the ntfy Android App to receive notifications directly on your phone. Just like the server, this app is also open source. Since I don't have an iPhone or a Mac, I didn't make an iOS app yet. I'd be awesome if someone else could help out.
Android
You can get the Android app from both Google Play and from F-Droid. Both are largely identical, with the one exception that the F-Droid flavor does not use Firebase.
Overview
A picture is worth a thousand words. Here are a few screenshots showing what the app looks like. It's all pretty straight forward. You can add topics and as soon as you add them, you can publish messages to them.
If those screenshots are still not enough, here's a video:
Message priority
When you publish messages to a topic, you can define a priority. This priority defines how urgently Android will notify you about the notification, and whether they make a sound and/or vibrate.
By default, messages with default priority or higher (>= 3) will vibrate and make a sound. Messages with high or urgent priority (>= 4) will also show as pop-over, like so:
You can change these settings in Android by long-pressing on the app, and tapping "Notifications". You can then configure the settings (and custom sounds or vibration) for each of the priorities:
Instant delivery
Instant delivery allows you to receive messages on your phone instantly, even when your phone is in doze mode, i.e. when the screen turns off, and you leave it on the desk for a while. This is achieved with a foreground service, which you'll see as a permanent notification that looks like this:
Android does not allow you to dismiss this notification, unless you turn off the notification channel in the settings. To do so, long-press on the foreground notification (screenshot above) and navigate to the settings. Then toggle the "Subscription Service" off:
Limitations without instant delivery
Without instant delivery, messages may arrive with a significant delay (sometimes many minutes, or even hours later). If you've ever picked up your phone and suddenly had 10 messages that were sent long before you know what I'm talking about.
The reason for this is Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM). FCM is the only Google approved way to send push messages to Android devices, and it's what pretty much all apps use to deliver push notifications. Firebase is overall pretty bad at delivering messages in time, but on Android, most apps are stuck with it.
The ntfy Android app uses Firebase only for the main host ntfy.sh, and only in the Google Play flavor of the app.
It won't use Firebase for any self-hosted servers, and not at all in the the F-Droid flavor.
iPhone/iOS
I almost feel devious for putting the Download on the App Store button on this page. Currently, there is no iOS app for ntfy, but it's in the works. You can track the status on GitHub.
