Bedtime Mode Not Working on iPhone or iPad?

If you’re having issues with your lock screen not dimming with Do Not Disturb’s Bedtime Mode or if Bedtime mode isn’t working, check out our top suggestions to get this feature working today!

Just to clear up some confusion, iOS now includes two bedtime features–bedtime mode in Do Not Disturb and bedtime in the Clock App. Confusing the two is easy!

Related Articles

• How To Set Up Do Not Disturb Bedtime Mode on your iPhone and iPad
• Setup and Use the Good Morning Lock Screen on your iPhone or iPad
• How to wake up to your favorite Music using iPhone’s clock app
• Use All The New Do Not Disturb Features in iOS

Bedtime Mode Vs. the Clock App’s Bedtime

Bedtime in the Clock App helps you maintain a consistent sleep schedule based on how many hours you want to sleep each night and the time you want to wake up each morning. 

It sends reminders when to go to bed and rings an alarm for when you want to arise.

Bedtime Mode for Do Not Disturb works when you set a Do Not Disturb scheduled time for sleep and rest. When you turn on Bedtime Mode, it dims your display, silences any calls, notifications, sounds, or vibrations until your scheduled DND ends. With bedtime mode, any calls or notifications received automatically route to your Notification Center instead of the lock screen. And you check those when you get up.

Check Your Bedtime Settings

Make sure everything is set-up as it should be!

For iOS12+

1. Open the Clock app
2. Tap Bedtime from the bottom tabs
3. Choose Set Up, if shown, and follow the onscreen instructions
   1. Set your wake-up time, alarm sound, and the time you usually go to sleep
   2. Choose the days you want to adhere to this schedule
   3. Turn on Bedtime Schedule and tap Done
4. To adjust previous settings, tap Options

For iOS 11 and below

1. Go to Settings > Do Not Disturb
2. Toggle on Scheduled
3. Set Your From and To Times
4. Toggle on Bedtime Mode

See this article for more details on setting up Bedtime Mode.

Restart iDevice

If you have not already, restart your iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch to see if that fixes the problem or if the issue persists.

Power your device off and then back on again or use the Settings feature to Shut Down (Settings > General > Shut Down) your device and then power back up. 

If a Restart Didn’t Help, Try a Forced Restart

• On an iPhone 6S or below plus all iPads with home buttons & iPod Touches 6th generation and below, press Home and Power at the same time until you see the Apple logo
• For iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus and iPod touch 7th generation: Press and hold both the Side and Volume Down buttons for at least 10 seconds, until you see the Apple logo 
• On an iPhone 8 and above and iPads without home buttons: Press and quickly release the Volume Up button. Then press and promptly release the Volume Down button. Finally, press and hold the Side/Top button until you see the Apple logo 

Screen Not Dimming With Bedtime Mode?

Check Auto-Lock

Verify that you enabled Auto-Lock to a setting from 30 seconds to 5 minutes under Settings > Display & Brightness. If it’s listed as Never, select a setting. 

Enable Auto-Brightness

Another setting to check is if you have Auto-Brightness toggled on by tapping Settings > General > Accessibility > Display Accommodations > Auto-Brightness. If it’s toggled off, turn it on. 

Reset All Settings

There may be a random setting getting in the way of bedtime mode. So rather than going one by one to try and isolate the problem, let’s reset all settings in one step.

Go to Settings >General >Reset >Reset All Settings. 

This action resets to default everything in Settings, including notifications, alerts, brightness, and clock settings like wake up alarms.

So you need to reconfigure these settings once your iPhone or iDevice restarts.

Want An Alarm? Set Up Bedtime in the Clock App Too!

If you like having an alarm (or music) wake you up each morning, you’ll want to pair Bedtime Mode with Bedtime in the Clock App.

You’d think the information you entered in Do Not Disturb’s (DND) Bedtime Mode and Scheduled would transfer to the Clock App, but it doesn’t. You need to add in your scheduled sleep times again–just make sure they are the same as your bedtime mode for DND!

Set Up Bedtime in the Clock App

1. Open the Clock App
2. Tap the Bedtime icon in the bottom menu 
3. Choose Get Started
4. Set your Wake Up time (match your DND’s bedtime mode) and tap next
5. Choose the days of the week you want the alarm set for and press next 
6. Add in how many hours you want to sleep each night (again, match you DND’s bedtime mode)
7. Choose the interval for bedtime reminders
8. Select your alarm sound from the list
   1. To choose a song, see this article
9. Save your bedtime settings

Change your Bedtime Settings

Elizabeth Jones( Content Producer )

For most of her professional life, Amanda Elizabeth (Liz for short) trained all sorts of folks on how to use media as a tool to tell their own unique stories. She knows a thing or two about teaching others and creating how-to guides!

Her clients include Edutopia, Scribe Video Center, Third Path Institute, Bracket, The Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Big Picture Alliance.

Elizabeth received her Master of Fine Arts degree in media making from Temple University, where she also taught undergrads as an adjunct faculty member in their department of Film and Media Arts.