Facebook Birthday Notifications Not Showing? What to Check
You used to see whose birthday it was on Facebook, and now you don't, or some friends never show up at all. It is usually one of three things: your friend's own setting, your notification settings, or your phone. Here is how to check each.
The short answer
Facebook only tells you about a friend's birthday if that friend shares the day and month of it, so some friends never show up. For the rest, check that birthday notifications are on (Settings & privacy, then Settings, then Notifications) and that your phone allows notifications from the Facebook app. You can always see today's and upcoming birthdays yourself under Friends, then Birthdays. For the birthdays you can't afford to miss, keep a copy outside Facebook that reminds you.
Why some friends never show up
On Facebook, each person chooses who can see the day and month of their birthday, and the year separately. Facebook's help center says that if someone chooses not to share the day and month, their friends won't get a notification about their upcoming birthday. No setting on your side changes that. For those friends, you need the date yourself: here's how to ask someone for their birthday.
See birthdays without waiting for a notification
From your Facebook Feed, select Friends in the left menu, then Birthdays. You'll see today's, recent and upcoming birthdays. If a friend's birthday is there, Facebook knows it, and the problem is your notifications. If it isn't, they haven't shared it with you.
Check your notification settings
On a computer:
- 1.Click your profile picture at the top right of Facebook.
- 2.Select Settings & privacy, then Settings.
- 3.Click Notifications.
- 4.Find birthdays in the list, and check what you're notified about and how.
Facebook's help center points to these settings for birthday notifications. You can't turn off Facebook's notifications entirely, but you can turn off kinds of them, so a birthday setting switched off at some point would explain the silence.
Check that your phone allows Facebook's notifications
Notifications on your lock screen also need your phone's permission:
- iPhone: open Settings, tap Notifications, then Facebook, and turn on Allow Notifications.
- Android: open your phone's settings, tap Apps & notifications (or Apps), then Facebook, then Notifications, and turn them on.
A Focus or Do Not Disturb can also hold notifications back while it's on.
Don't let Facebook be your only list
Even when it all works, Facebook only covers friends who are on Facebook and share their birthday, and a notification in a busy feed is easy to scroll past. Facebook's help pages don't describe a way to export your friends' birthdays. So copy the birthdays that matter somewhere you control: your phone's contacts, a calendar or a reminder service. Here's how to remember birthdays without Facebook, and how to keep track of friends' birthdays beyond it.
A reminder by email, with the message ready
Greetigo is one option. It doesn't connect to Facebook: you add the birthdays that matter once, by hand or as a pasted list of names and dates, and each one repeats every year. Greetigo emails you in the morning, your time: the day before by default, or on the day, or 1, 3, 7 or 14 days before, and you can pick more than one.
Each reminder comes with a message already written: a free template with their name, or on Plus and Premium the AI-written draft you saved for that date. Copy it into Messenger, a text or a card, or, if you saved their email address, send it from Greetigo. Nothing is sent until you click Send.
It's free for up to 10 saved dates. It works in any browser, including your phone's. There's no iPhone or Android app, and reminders come by email, not as phone notifications or texts.