Native toast notifications not displaying on Windows 10

shawngray17280 1 Reputation point
2022-09-07T10:29:46.03+00:00

Hi,

First-time poster here so hoping this is the correct forum for this and I've followed the rules (I believe I have!) Would be very grateful for any assistance at all with this issue as it's driving my colleague and I up the wall currently. Description of issue and summary of what we've tried to date to fix it follow...

Windows Toast Notifications Issue

Issue explanation:

Native HTML5 toast notifications do not work in Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome, and possibly other applications. This has been tested with the Outlook 365 WebApp, the Microsoft Teams WebApp, as well as the HTML5 Web Notifications Test website pictured below:

238538-1.jpg

Note how the website has been granted permission to display notifications, and has supposedly displayed one, but no notification has appeared on screen, nor is one present within the Action Centre.

The issue is occurring on Windows 10 21H2 19044.1889 with Microsoft Edge v104, though other versions may be affected too.

Evidence pointing towards the fact that this should be working:

Notifications for other applications work correctly, e.g. Windows Defender, PowerShell:

238562-2.jpg

Notifications are permitted/enabled within Microsoft Edge:

238555-3.jpg

Notifications are enabled within the Windows 10 Settings:

238517-4.jpg

Focus Assist is disabled:

238585-5.jpg

Background apps are enabled:

238460-6.jpg

The Windows Push Notification services are enabled and running:

238545-7.jpg

The Windows Event Log shows that the notification has been received by the Push Notification service:

238519-8.jpg

Microsoft Edge is successfully connected to the WNS server:

238601-9.jpg

We've attempted the following so far to resolve:

  • Logging off/on and rebooting
  • Three different Windows 10 devices
  • Multiple different notification sources (Teams WebApp, Outlook WebApp, etc)
  • Running Edge as administrator
  • Restarting the Push Notification services
  • Toggling notifications on/off
  • Toggling background apps on/off
  • Reviewing Group Policy and system configuration
  • Completing all Windows Updates
  • Reinstalling Windows

We've also tried to compile a list of outstanding potential areas to try that may be relevant but sadly this has gone beyond our expertise at this point:

Microsoft Edge is not listed as an option within the Windows 10 notifications settings - does this matter?

238594-10.jpg

Microsoft Edge is not listed as an option within the Windows 10 background apps settings - does this matter?

238602-11.jpg

Disabling the following Microsoft Edge flag allows non-native notifications to work, however these are being phased out in favour of native notifications, and do not get added to the Action Center:

238539-12.jpg

Disabling the following Microsoft Edge flag also seems to make Edge fallback to the legacy non-native notifications - is this relevant?

238520-13.jpg

  • AppUserModelIDs/AUMIDs?
  • WinRT?

As I say - any assistance, advice, points of contact at MS - anything that could help at this point we'd be grateful for.

Thanks in advance all...

Shawn

Windows for business | Windows Client for IT Pros | User experience | Other
Microsoft Edge | Microsoft Edge development
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3 answers

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-09-08T03:39:01.83+00:00

    Hi @shawngray17280

    I can see the Edge notifications in Action Center like below. I think the issue in your computer is related with Edge not showing in Get notifications from these senders. You need to turn on Edge option in it so that you can get notifications.

    238846-image.png 238808-image.png

    There're some possible fixes for you, you can have a try:

    • Go to edge://flags/#enable-system-notifications in Edge and set Enable system notifications to Enabled.
    • Update Edge to the latest version which is v105.
    • Check if this policy DefaultNotificationsSetting is set in the computers and make sure it's not set BlockNotifications.
    • If the above still can't fix the issue, you can refer to the Repair Microsoft Edge part in this doc to repair Edge.
    • You can also do a SFC scan as the issue may be caused by a corrupted/missing system file. Please follow this article on how to run a SFC scan in Windows 10.

    If the answer is the right solution, please click "Accept Answer" and kindly upvote it. If you have extra questions about this answer, please click "Comment".
    Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.

    Regards,
    Yu Zhou

    1 person found this answer helpful.

  2. Limitless Technology 39,931 Reputation points
    2022-09-09T08:57:36.297+00:00

    Hi Shawngray17280-9791,

    It’s because A new Windows requirement for toast notifications is introduced in Windows 10, version 1607, and it is enforced starting with Windows 10, version 1709. The Windows requirement specifies that an application's shortcut on the Start menu must contain an AppUserModelID tag. However, the Outlook shortcut that's created by the OCT doesn't contain the AppUserModelID tag, so toast notifications aren't displayed.

    For desktop applications that send toast notifications, you must include the AppUserModelID tag of your application's shortcut on the Start screen each time that you call the CreateToastNotifier method. If you don't do this, your toast notifications won't be displayed. For details, see Quickstart: Sending a toast notification from the desktop :- https://learn.microsoft.com/previous-versions/windows/desktop/legacy/hh802768(v=vs.85)

    To work around fix this issue, follow these steps:

    Perform a Windows installer (MSI) installation of Outlook without using the OCT. Then, the Outlook shortcut that contains the AppUserModelID tag will be created in the following location:

    C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs

    Copy the new Outlook shortcut, and deploy it on the computers that have the issue.

    To know more about Toast content refer to this documentation :- https://learn.microsoft.com/windows/apps/design/shell/tiles-and-notifications/adaptive-interactive-toasts

    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    --If the reply is helpful, please Upvote and Accept it as an answer--

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  3. shawngray17280 1 Reputation point
    2022-09-15T08:53:56.913+00:00

    Update: We have managed to resolve the issue (for now) after possibly two-dozen hours wasted with investigating it.

    In summary, the issue for us was that Edge's AppUserModelId (AUMID) was not registered in the registry, which is something that is a requirement for toast notifications to be shown. This is well-documented, but is generally only relevant for third-party app development, rather than an official Microsoft product that is built-in to the OS.

    Unfortunately, there seems to be literally no debugging/error information available that points towards the lack of registration being the cause of the notification disappearing into a black hole. This is rather frustrating, as it seems like something that'd be very easy for the Windows Notification Service to report on via the event log, rather than simply indicating that the notification is being processed successfully. If I'm simply looking in the wrong place for this, please let me know!

    I do not know why the Edge AUMID wasn't registered on our devices, however I have a feeling that it's due to the fact that we have a Group Policy Preference that deletes the standard Edge shortcut that is provided by the system and replaces it with one that has some custom command arguments. I'm assuming that because the Edge shortcut is deleted half-way through the build process (we use SCCM), the registry is not correctly populated with an AUMID entry for it.

    However, I am not certain of this, as we have another device (unmanaged) that does not have the AUMID registry entry, yet Edge notifications work correctly. This is an older build though that originally had the legacy Edge Trident release and was upgraded to Edge Chromium, so this may make things different to a completely fresh build?

    To fix the issue, create the following two registry entries:

    reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\AppUserModelId\Microsoft.MicrosoftEdge.Stable_8wekyb3d8bbwe!App" /v "DisplayName" /d "Microsoft Edge" /t "REG_EXPAND_SZ"  
    
    reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\AppUserModelId\Microsoft.MicrosoftEdge.Stable_8wekyb3d8bbwe!App" /v "CustomActivator" /d "{628ACE20-B77A-456F-A88D-547DB6CEEDD5}" /t "REG_SZ"  
    

    The CustomActivator value contains the COM class ID (CLSID) for the Edge notification helper (628ACE20-B77A-456F-A88D-547DB6CEEDD5), which is what handles notification clicks, etc. There is surprisingly little reference to this CLSID online, however it does appear to have remained static for at least 2 years, all the way back to Edge versions in the 80's (we're on 105 at the time of writing).

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