How to pin a note to your Android notifications

Some things you need to see again in an hour, not next week: where you parked, the gate code for a friend’s building, the one task that matters today. A note app is a few taps away. Your notification shade is one swipe away, and you look at it all day anyway.

Android has no built-in way to put your own words there. Notifications come from apps, so you need an app that posts one for you and keeps it there. Shadowkit’s Notify skill does that with pins.

What a pin is

A pin is a notification with your own title and text, like “Parking: Level 3, bay C14. Back by 18:00.” It has no time and no schedule. It shows up the moment you pin it, without a sound or a buzz, and stays in the shade until you unpin it.

Title and text. A title of up to 40 characters, and up to 240 characters of text if you want more than a title. Pull the notification down and you see the whole text.
Unpin from the notification. Each pin has Unpin and Edit buttons, so you don’t have to open the app to clear it.
It survives a restart. After your phone restarts or the app updates, your pins come back by themselves.

To make one, tap + on Notify’s page, choose Pin, and type. A preview at the top shows how the notification will look as you write.

When you swipe it away

Since Android 14, you can swipe away nearly any notification, even one an app means to keep. That’s good for apps that won’t leave you alone, but it means a pin can disappear with one careless swipe or a Clear all.

So each pin has a switch, Bring it back if swiped, on by default. With it on, a swiped pin comes back. With it off, a swipe hides it, and Notify’s page marks it “Swiped away” with a Show again button. Either way, a pin only goes for good when you unpin it.

Think about the lock screen

A notification can show on your lock screen, where anyone holding your phone can read it. That’s handy for a parking spot and a bad idea for a door code.

Each pin has a second switch, Show on the lock screen. With it off, the locked screen shows only “Pinned note”, and the text appears once you unlock. Turn it off for anything you wouldn’t write on a sticky note on the outside of your phone.

Several pins stay together

One pin sits as its own notification. Two or more are kept together under a Pinned heading, so they don’t get mixed in with reminders or other apps’ notifications.

Good things to pin

Where you parked, and when the ticket runs out.
A code for a gate, a locker or a hotel room (with the lock screen off).
Today’s one thing, so it’s there every time you pull down the shade.
A number to call back after a meeting.
The shopping you can’t forget, when a whole list would be too much. For a full checklist, use Notes.

Offline, like the rest of Shadowkit

Pins are made and kept on your phone. There’s no account and nothing is sent anywhere: the app doesn’t have internet access. If you use profiles, every profile’s pins show, with the profile’s name in front when you have more than one.

Pins are Android only, because an iPhone doesn’t let an app keep a notification in place. The free version holds 3 reminders and pins together in a profile, and Shadowkit Pro raises that. For notifications at a time you choose, see reminders in plain words.