iPhones don’t have an alarm ring length option and nobody wants to hear an alarm clock ring for an hour!
We love using our phone alarm clocks to wake us or just to remind us things at various times of the day. Who doesn’t have dozens of different alarms set up for different reminders?? A mincha reminder a few minutes before shkiah, a Friday afternoon alarm reminding us to set up the Shabbos mode on the fridge, a Sunday morning wakeup half an hour after the weekday one…
But iPhones still don’t have a setting to control the length of time the alarm will ring. Which means if you use it to wake you on Shabbos, it’ll ring for an hour before turning itself off. For most of us, that’s not really an option we can live with.
But there’s a hack to work around this problem!
Set an alarm with a regular ring tone for the time you want. Then create another alarm – one minute later. On this alarm, in the sound menu, scroll all the way down to “none” and select that. This second – silent – alarm will cancel out the earlier one with the sound.
And you can set up multiple sets of these alarms so you can get a post-nap wakeup, too! Just make sure your phone is charging!
Note: We suggest testing this out on a weekday to make sure you got the settings right before running into problems on Shabbos.
Thanks to Avi Diena for sharing this hack.
Brilliant!
Genius!!!
While this seems to be a plausible and workable route to have an alarm ring on Shabbos for whatever the need may be, the idea seems to be a tad unshabbosdik. There are a myriad of reasons. Firstly, I can’t help but think this may lead to touching a phone by mistake, chalila, on Shabbos (similar to the reasoning of not learning alone by candlelight on Friday night). Additionally, the separation and elevation we have from this mandatory, universal “drop the phone” day of rest feels somehow violated with this method. I hope I’m not the only one who read this post and was left with a clammy feeling in my stomach. As ambassadors to us “between carpools” clan, please reconsider using this method as well as sharing this entire post. Shabbos without a phone is something holy. Let’s not be the ones to change that.
I totally agree.
I totally agree. Leave your phone completely off and away for shabos
Here’s a tip if you use your phone for an alarm on shabbos: wrap your phone in a tissue before shabbos which reminds you not to swipe while you’re half asleep.
I’m in agreement here. On shabbos your phone should be OFF and PUT AWAY. There are plenty of alarms on the market that go off after a minute or so that you can use for shabbos. Leaving our phone on and in your bedroom is a risky proposition for many reasons.
As far as I know the alarm on iPhone rings just for 15 minutes. Learned by mistake after forgetting to shut phone 🙂
I don’t see the problem. This is not called using your phone on Shabbos. You don’t even have to keep your phone in view to use it as an alarm. It can be kept behind something else or under your night table, etc. I don’t see why it’s any less shabbosdik than using another alarm clock that you also might turn off or snooze by mistake.
Great idea!
totally agree using phone as alarm on shabbos just doesn’t pass the sniff test. Shabbos needs to feel different smell, taste, and sound different than the rest of the week.
Huh? Youre not allowed to have the same alarm sound on shabbos as during the week? This is almost comical. Any alarm sound is technically a weekday sound and a muktza item. How are we aupposed to grt woken up?
I think people are getting worked up because the post is about an iphone. Would you be the same upset if it was a kosher flip phone alarm?
Side note if you use this hack – the next time you set any alarm, the default will be SILENT. So remember to select a sound for your next weekday alarm!
In a world where technology and tradition often intersect
When this was originally posted I just scrolled by, not something I’d use as my phone is always off on shabbos. But one of my kids had surgery this week and needs medicine around the clock – there’s no way I’d wake up in the middle of the night on time to give it to him! This idea is perfect! I don’t need to buy a shabbos alarm clock just for one week and can use my preset alarms from the week to make sure he’ll get his medicine on time all shabbos. Thank you bcp!
This is a fantastic way to set a Shabbos alarm !
You can choose to have the alarms snooze or not!
I use a more gentle alarm on my Shabbos morning wake up alarm than during the week. In the summer when I think there’s a good chance I’ll nap but need to be up before I’m awoken I set a second set of alarms for the afternoon.
I keep my phone not within reach and the phone doesn’t actually need to be charging. If the battery is full enough before Shabbos, turn off wifi and put on airplane mode and it doesn’t need to be charging.
If you do need to keep your phone on simply put it(can customize the schedule easily!) it on ‘do not disturb.’