• Users who choose to turn off alarms turn to devices such as smart watches and smart speakers to access the news

• Respondents who receive alerts sporadically tend to avoid the news because of the complexity they perceive in trying to understand them

News alerts are emerging as a valuable resource for staying current and broadening perspective beyond breaking news. New opportunities for use include rich notifications, which include video, images and real-time data . On the other hand, automation and bots in messaging apps such as WhatsApp are emerging channels for informative notifications. However, rigorous assessment is sometimes omitted when sensational headlines are used or multiple alerts are sent that do not seem relevant. It is pertinent to note that the vast majority of respondents confirm not having received news alerts during the last week.

In the year 2025, the reasons for this leave exposure were analyzed in 28 markets. The results show that more than 40% of users deactivated this subject of notifications. The highest levels of deactivation were observed in South Africa and South Korea. In the remaining markets, the tendency to disable alerts remained between 30% and 50%, with the sole exception of Japan, where the proportion of users who chose to avoid alerts was slightly lower.

In Spain, approximately 30% of those surveyed say they have not received such notifications. In contrast, 15% admit to receiving them occasionally. If we look at those who have intentionally deactivated notifications, 17% admit that they have done so because they received too many of them. In addition, just over 10% of users were identified as having turned off alert notifications when download the news app. This figure is comparable to that of those who decided to do without them because they considered them to be of little use.

Less attention to information notices among women and young users

It is worth noting that the percentage of women (30%) who say they have never received this subject of notification is five percentage points higher than that of men. Likewise, a greater number of men (18%) acknowledge having turned them off due to their abundance, compared to 16% of women who associate this reason. The deactivation of alarms due to greater informational engagement (those who downloaded the news app) is more B men, as is the figure for those who dispensed with the function because they did not perceive a clear utility. In both cases, these reasons are below 15%.

The age distribution reveals that the highest number of people who have never received information alerts is concentrated among young people. Nearly 30% of respondents between 18 and 24 years of age say that the lack of attention to notifications is the reason for this situation. In the rest of the age brackets this trend is maintained, although it is slightly lower in the 45-55 age group . Those who received fewer alerts in the last week or receive them occasionally also have an outstanding frequency in the young and adult audience (45 years and older).

Respondents who deactivated the alerts because they considered there were too many are located, to a greater extent, in the 25-34 and 45-54 age brackets, with 20% in each case. The highest number of those who downloaded the news app (and turned off notifications) is among middle-aged people (35 to 44 years old).

If we make a distribution by level of income and programs of study, we can see that once again, the percentage of those who have not received news alerts extends across all income and educational levels, with data reaching 30%. Secondly, the perception of an excess of news alerts, which has led to their voluntary deactivation, is somewhat more common among people with low and middle incomes. This tendency is accentuated among respondents with higher levels of education, especially among those who have completed university or postgraduate program programs of study . On the other hand, there is an upward trend among people who deactivated the alerts when download the news application: the higher the level of income and programs of study, the higher the reason. This may be due to the fact that the information received has aroused interest or there is a greater commitment on the part of citizens.

Reasons to avoid information alerts: interest, payment and devices used

When studying how these reasons are associated with interest in information, it is observed that 32% of those who have never received alerts from the beginning express disinterest in the news, compared to 27% who do. In the rest of the reasons mentioned by those surveyed for not receiving news through these notifications, the trend shows notable decreases. It should also be noted that almost 30% of those interested in the news deactivated the notifications because they considered that they contained too much information. Among those who are not interested, 18% say they turned them off when they downloaded the application to consume it.

Once we have seen how the percentage of individuals who show interest or disinterest in news is distributed, we seek to determine whether there is a relationship between the reasons for avoiding news alerts and paying for information online. As expected, the percentage of individuals who do not receive news alerts and therefore do not pay for news is significantly higher. Only 12% of respondents pay for online information. In the remaining options, the percentage of individuals who have paid for news content is slightly higher than those who have not, at 20%.

An analysis of the devices used for news consumption among individuals who disable alarms reveals significant differences. In first written request, 46% of users state that their preferred device for accessing information is the smart watch or speaker (such as Alexa, Google Assistant or Siri), as well as tablets. This percentage is three percentage points higher than those who prefer the cell phone (smartphone) and the computer. On the other hand, it is evident that less than 20% of users deactivate alarms and do not use these devices for news consumption.

News avoidance and reasons for not receiving news alerts

Once the distribution of payment for online news has been observed, we explore whether there is a relationship between the reasons for avoiding these alerts and the avoidance of information content. Among those who had never received alerts, 28% claim to have avoided news, while 31% claim not to have done so (at least not deliberately). Among users who deactivated alerts, the percentage of avoidance is higher than among those who do not avoid information (in all cases less than 15%). Finally, those who received news occasionally have a similar percentage.

Expanding the general avoidance framework to discover the subject of news that the Spanish audience rejects, interesting variations are observed. First, those who have never received alerts tend to avoid news about war and politics by 31%. Next, we find those who identify a lot of news coverage (29%) and those who reject them because of their difficulty to understand them.

Those who deactivated the alerts because they found them to be excessive cite excessive news coverage as the main reason for evasion. Likewise, those who deactivated the alerts because of their uselessness and those who have not received them during the week include information that is difficult to understand as the main reason for avoidance.