How to Turn Off Google Chrome Notifications on a Mac

Silencing the Constant Pings and Pop-ups

In theory, web browser notifications are a useful feature. They allow your favourite news website to alert you to breaking stories, or your webmail provider to ping you when an important message arrives. In practice, however, they are often incredibly annoying. Almost every website you visit nowadays immediately prompts you with a pop-up asking to “Show Notifications,” and if you accidentally click “Allow,” you will be bombarded with distracting alerts sliding into the corner of your Mac screen all day long.

If you use Google Chrome as your primary browser on a Mac, these notifications are integrated directly into macOS. This means they will slide out from the right side of your screen and pile up in your Mac’s Notification Centre, even if Chrome is hidden in the background.

Fortunately, you do not have to live with the constant interruptions. You can either revoke notification permissions for specific, annoying websites (like a news site that sends too many alerts), or you can change a global setting to ensure Google Chrome never asks to send you a notification ever again.

Method 1: Stop Individual Websites from Sending Notifications

If you generally like receiving notifications from important tools like Slack or Gmail, but you accidentally allowed a spammy blog to send you alerts, you can revoke permission for that specific site without affecting the others.

1. Open the Google Chrome browser on your Mac.
2. Look at the very top right corner of the browser window (next to your profile picture) and click the three vertical dots to open the Chrome menu.
3. Scroll down the menu and click on Settings.
4. In the new Settings tab that opens, look at the left-hand sidebar and click on Privacy and security.
5. In the main window area, click on Site settings.
6. Scroll down slightly to the “Permissions” section and click on Notifications.

You are now on the master Notifications control panel. Scroll down to the bottom of the page, where you will see a section titled Allowed to send notifications. This is a list of every single website that currently has permission to ping your Mac.

7. Locate the website you want to silence (e.g., annoying-news-site.com).
8. Click the three vertical dots next to the website’s name.
9. Click Remove. (You can also click “Block” to ensure it never asks you again).

That specific website will instantly be silenced, while your important work notifications will continue to function normally.

Method 2: Stop Chrome from Asking for Permission Globally

If you never, ever want a website to send you a notification, and you are tired of clicking “Block” every time a new webpage loads, you can disable the feature entirely.

Follow the exact same path as Method 1:

1. Open Chrome Settings > Privacy and security > Site settings > Notifications.
2. Look at the very top of the page under the “Default behaviour” section.
3. By default, “Sites can ask to send notifications” is selected. Instead, click the circular radio button next to Don’t allow sites to send notifications.

When this setting is enabled, Chrome automatically blocks every notification request in the background. You will never see the “Allow Notifications?” pop-up again, allowing you to browse the web in peace.

Method 3: Muting Chrome Temporarily (macOS Do Not Disturb)

What if you need notifications turned on for work, but you have a one-hour Zoom presentation and cannot risk an embarrassing pop-up appearing on your screen while you are screen-sharing? You do not need to dig into Chrome’s settings; you can simply use the built-in Do Not Disturb feature on your Mac.

1. Look at the very top right corner of your Mac’s screen (the macOS menu bar) and click the Control Centre icon (it looks like two small toggle switches).
2. Click on Focus (the icon shaped like a crescent moon).
3. Click on Do Not Disturb.

For as long as the crescent moon icon is visible in your menu bar, macOS will intercept all notifications from Google Chrome (and every other app on your computer) and hide them silently in your Notification Centre. When your presentation is finished, simply click the moon icon again to turn Do Not Disturb off, and all your alerts will flow through normally once more.